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THE CATHEDRALS
OF CENTRAL ITALY

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157 3257257
SIENA: INTERIOR OF THE CATHEDRAL.
THE CATHEDRALS
OF CENTRAL ITALY
a By
T. FRANCIS BUMPUS
“Ill-judged was the allegory which placed the statues of Painting, Sculpture,
and Architecture as the mourners round the tomb of Michael Angelo. We do
not pay due honour to Architecture if we consider her as the sister, and therefore
the equal, of the imitative arts : she is their queen.”—Sir Francis Palgrave.
With Twenty-seven Illustrations
NEW YORK
E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY
681 FIFTH AVENUE
CONTENTS
121
Chap. I The Journey
II The Arts subsidiary to Architecture~ I. Stained
Glass and Painting
79
III The Arts subsidiary to Architecture-11.
Sculpture
IV The Romanesque : Genoa, Pisa, Lucca, Pistoja 142
V The Gothicm-1. Siena, Orvieto
182
VI The Gothic-Il. Assisi, Arezzo
233
VII The Gothic—III. Florence, Pistoja and Lucca 272
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Siena, interior of the Cathedral
Frontis
Pisa, the Cathedral, Baptistery and Leaning Tower
Orvieto Cathedral, from the north-west
Siena Cathedral, from the south-west
Rome, interior of Sta Maria in Cosmedin
Assisi, interior of the Lower Church of St Francis
Arezzo Cathedral, from the south-west
Perugia Cathedral, from the north-east
Arezzo, façade of Sta Maria della Pieve
Prato Cathedral, interior looking east
Lucca Cathedral, view across the nave
East window of Siena Cathedral
Lucca, the font in San Frediano
Lucca, west front of San Frediano
Pistoja, interior of San Andrea
(Showing the Pulpit by Giovanni Pisano)
Genoa, central western doorway of the Cathedral
Genoa Cathedral, interior looking east
Pisa Cathedral, interior looking east
Pistoja, the campanile and baptistery of the Cathedral
Orvieto Cathedral, the font
Assisi, interior of the Upper Church of St Francis
Toscanella, west front of Sta Maria
Arezzo Cathedral, the nave looking east
Florence, the nave of Sta Maria Novella, looking east
Florence Cathedral, the nade looking east
Florence, the nave of Sta Croce, looking east
148
156
174
246
246
260
260
288
288
vii
The Cathedrals of Central
Italy
CHAPTER I
The Journey
T TOWEVER we may be delighted with the works of
1 Nature, which she has sculptured and painted for
our solace and instruction, however greatly we may be
moved by the sublimity of her mountains or awed by the
resistless force of her waters, there is a charm about
architecture that touches us more closely, for in its works
we see forms of beauty designed by man for man's delight;
while the colossal structures that man has created, though
insignificant as compared with Nature's works, still astonish
us, for they recall to our minds that they have been the
works of countless pigmies like ourselves, raised to excite
emotions that still tell of the builders' gratitude to
superior powers.
Even the Pyramids, raised to the rulers of Egypt,
whose outlines break the long line of the desert, show
rather thankfulness for the honour once bestowed on their
occupants than the pride of kings. The charms of certain
masterpieces of architecture are not to be effaced from
the memory, and vie with the recollections of Nature's
beauties, if they do not surpass them. I may mention,
among the loveliest creations of man's genius which
00
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
seemed to strew the pathway of the Tour of which this
book treats, the façades of Siena and Orvieto ; the interiors
of Pisa and Lucca Cathedrals; the two great Romanesque
churches at Toscanella ; and the Baptistery Gates of
Florence.
Architecture and the arts subsidiary to it not only
throw a lustre on the reigns of kings, but in the monu-
ments they erect sum up most completely the cultivation
and tendencies of the nation, keep its memory green, and
where its glory has departed and all else has been swept
away, still point to the greatness and intelligence of the
people.
Architecture, that great art, styled by Aristotle “one
of the masters of the world,” rules over a wide domain, for
wherever man has cultivated his intellect and faculties
and raised his contemplation to the Almighty, sublime
churches have been raised. In contemplating the glorious
and captivating domain of art, we are taken out of our-
selves, and not only feel the ennobling flame that the fine
arts kindle within us, but are forcibly reminded of the
brotherhood of man. More than half of our solaces and
delights are due to the great discoverers who lived in
remote ages and in countries it has perhaps never been our
good fortune to visit, though we now have the glories of
architecture and its auxiliary arts brought home to us
through drawing, engraving and photography.
On the 12th of October 1909, one of those splendid
mornings which seem to summon us to contemplate the
last fine days of the expiring year, I set out with pleasur-
able anticipations for a Tour among the cathedrals and
churches of a country in which a sojourn enlarges that
shadowy realm of imagination and memory, into which
al
THE JOURNEY
we can always escape when pursued by troubles. In
moments of weariness and despondency - when the
weight of life is pressing hard upon us—the pictures we
have brought from Italy will rise up before us with restoring
power : those lovely forms will breathe their own peace
over the troubled spirit; the beauty which is there stamped
upon the earth, and expressed in marble and upon the
canvas, will glide into the mind, and help the thoughts to
rise above dwarfing cares and debasing pleasures.
The proverb that he who would bring back the wealth
of the Indies, applies with more force to Italy than to any
other country on the globe ; for Italy has had two distinct
lives : one ending with the downfall of the Roman Empire,
and one beginning with the new organisations which were
patched up out of the ruins of that colossal fabric. Nor is
this remarkable fact all; but, the two lives are unlike. In
Italy the child was not the father of the man : Roman and
Italian are by no means equivalent terms. No human
life would be long enough, no human powers would be
vigorous enough, to provide a perfect preparation for this
Roman history, Roman literature, and Roman law; of
Italian history and Italian literature; of the history of the
Christian Church and of art in all its forms. The best
faculties and the amplest opportunities must here select
and discriminate. But, on the other hand, there is the
the scholar who has done no more than read Virgil has, in
Italy, a sensible advantage over him who has not. Every
hour spent in previous preparation for an Italian tour
brings its recompense of reward. Let no one, therefore,
who is meditating such a journey, be discouraged by the
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
S
amount of what he cannot do ; but rather take encourage-
ment from the thought of how much can be done. In the
evenings of a single winter, judiciously and vigorously
occupied, the seeds of many a precious harvest can be
sown. The more learning the better ; but a little is not
dangerous. An ignorant man in Italy is a blind man in a
picture-gallery; he sees the reverse of the tapestry-a
transparency by daylight.
There being nothing to detain me at Calais, I left by
the boat-train and reached Amiens soon after five
o'clock. Though it was nearly dark by the time accom-
modation had been secured and some refreshment par-
taken of, I hastened to the Cathedral, and, as I entered the
stupendous pile, I thought I had never been so impressed
with its simplicity and grandeur. I remember seeing it
under precisely similar circumstances, though on a July
evening, twenty-two years ago, and it seemed to call up
all the old sensations. The last feeble rays of departing
twilight, breaking through those deep coloured windows
in the transepts, aisles and chapels of the nave and choir,
seemed to linger about the bold columns, caught here and
there by some projecting point, scarcely indicating the
vast and imposing height of the lofty arches above; un-
willing, as it were, to forsake a place which rouses such
mighty and mysterious thoughts.
The great bell was tolling as I entered, and I could just
distinguish a large mass of worshippers, or rather listeners,
for they were seated in low rush-bottomed chairs, in a
dense circle before the pulpit, and occupied a considerable
part of the vast nave; reduced in size to pigmies, under
the stupendous height of the vaulting above them. The
preacher who, with much eloquence and action, was
THE JOURNEY: AMIENS
holding forth to his rapt and eager auditory, was evidently
approaching the end of his discourse, for the candles on
and about the high altar were being lit up in preparation
for some solemn function. The sermon concluded, and
everything being in readiness, the great organ at the west
with crosses and banners, canons in white and gold copes,
one of whom bore the Host in its glittering monstrance,
taper-bearers, acolytes tossing thuribles, and singing boys
and men, made its appearance from the aisle behind the
high altar, and entering the choir passed down it and
through the great iron gates of the screen, chanting the
Adoro te devote, which with the Pange lingua and other
sacramental hymns, engaged the attention of the congrega-
tion as the train perambulated the south aisle and nave, a
showy but really magnificent extempore interlude, such
as only a French organist can play, being introduced be-
tween each verse.
On the following morning about nine o'clock I was
paying another enraptured visit to this “ colossus in re-
pose,” in anticipation of hearing the daily Capitular Mass
sung to that solemn music, “ according to the Use of
Amiens,” which had so impressed me on a former visit ; *
but, to my great disappointment, I was informed that it had
been discontinued for some time past, a Low Mass being
said in place of it at an earlier hour. " C'est tout à fait
* Two Plain Song Masses according to this Use have been
adapted to the Communion office of the Church of England, by the
Rev. Fleetwood Sheppard, and may be procured for a few pence at
Novello's. One of the few London churches in which these two
solemn Masses can be heard is Şt Matthias's, Stoke-Newington, where
it was introduced during the organistship of Dr W. H. Monk, in the
carly sixties of the last century.
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
abolie,” mournfully remarked my informant, who was
busied in putting some chairs straight in one of the
eastern chapels ; so there being little more to engage my
attention at Amiens, after a few hours' inspection of the
Cathedral, I resumed the journey Pariswards, halting at
Creil, where an afternoon was agreeably spent in renewing
my recollections of its irregularly-planned parish church-
rich in detail of the best Pointed periods—and of the
noble St Leu d'Esserent, which was reached after a pleasant
walk, partly along the banks of the Oise. I arrived in Paris
on the morning of the 16th of October, the anniversary
of the execution of Marie Antoinette, and as I traversed
those boulevards and quais which lie between the Gare
du Nord and the Gare de Lyon-not omitting to visit
en passant, that archetype of French Transitional
churches, the Cathedral of Notre Dame-I could not for-
bear calling to mind some of the incidents in the last
hours and journey to the guillotine of “ The worn, dis-
crowned widow of thirty-eight.” The penning of a
letter in the morning watch of that day which closed her
career of suffering and of wrong) to her sister-in-law, the
Princess Elizabeth, “ of whom it might be said, in the
words of Lord Clarendon, that she resembled a chapel in
a king's palace, into which nothing but piety and morality
enter, while all around is filled with sin, idleness and
folly!”* The departure from the Conciergerie of the
“ car of the condemned,” amidst cries of “ Vive la Re-
publique ! ” “ Place à l'Autrichienne !” “ Place à la
veuve Capet!"; the shouting of some wretches to her
as, her hands being bound, she was deprived of sup-
port against the jolting of the car, “ These are not your
* Sir Walter Scott, Life of Napoleon.
Caree
THE JOURNEY: PARIS
1
cushions of Trianon!”; the curls of her blanched hair
escaping from her cap, and flapping with the breeze on her
forehead; her wandering looks over the house fronts in the
Rue St Honoré, over the Republican inscriptions, and
over the costumes and physiognomy of Paris, so changed
to her since sixteen months of captivity ; her rapid glance
at the window whence was to descend upon her bowed
head the absolution of a disguised priest ; the stoppage of
the car-with a refinement of cruelty truly French-before
the entrance to the gardens of the Tuileries ; the inad-
vertent tread upon the foot of the executioner, and the
“Pardon me !" uttered to him in a tone of voice as if she
had spoken to one of her courtiers in the gorgeous salons
of Versailles or Fontainebleau ; her kneeling for an instant
and uttering a half-audible prayer ; her “ Adieu once
again, my children," looking towards the towers of the
Temple, “ I go to rejoin your father!”; her abstention
from justifying herself before the people or moving them
to pity by any appeal to the memory of her husband;
her flight from earth; her legacy to it of her indignation
and its own remorse. These thoughts chased themselves
through my mind all the way from Paris to Sens, and were
only put to flight by those inspired by the solemn majesty
of its cathedral. From Sens I journeyed on the ensuing
morning and the two days subsequent, through Tonnerre,
Dijon, Bourg en Bresse, and Chambéry to Modane,
where the French train was exchanged for the Italian
one, and so through Turin to Genoa, of which I caught my
first view in the rich sunset of an October afternoon.
The best views of the city of Genoa are from the light-
house and its neighbourhood; and a more imposing view of
a city cannot be imagined. The houses terraced up to the
un reme
.
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
very crown of the hill—the numerous short, square spires,
domes and belfries—the fine church of Sta Maria Carig-
nano occupying the summit-and the noble basin below,
with its multitude of shipping-produce an impression
which is scarcely retained in its full force after we
have re-entered the town. The streets, or rather rows (for
there are comparatively few which admit a carriage I
am speaking of that quarter which lies between the Via
Balbi, the Annunziata and the harbour)-are very
narrow; and even the celebrated street of palaces has not
sufficient width to allow a favourable view of these noble
buildings. Nevertheless, it has much interest and pictur-
esque beauty, and the narrow thoroughfares in the part
of the city just indicated, thronged incessantly with a
crowded population, can have changed but little since
Charles Dickens gave us his vivid impressions of them in
those Pictures from Italy which, on its establishment in
1846, he contributed to the Daily News.
The whole town is built on the hillside, so that in the
matter of no little difficulty to find the church of which
you are in quest. I deemed it expedient, therefore, prior to
commencing my ecclesiological researches, to devote' a
whole day to discovering, with the aid of an excellent
map, politely furnished by the Padrona of the Hotel
Liguria—a quiet, comfortable house, by the way, without
any pretensions to fashion-the whereabouts of the
several churches ; took casual glances around them, and
having impressed their several situations on the memory,
was enabled, by various inferences and knowledge of
localities, to pursue my studies among them with the
least possible delay. The chief local peculiarities of the
THE JOURNEY: GENOA
Genoese churches are to be found in (1) Plan; (2)
Towers; (3) Design of façade ; (4) Material ; (5) Mouldings.
The least altered churches are: the nave of the cathe-
dral, San Donato, Sta Maria in Castello, San Stefano, and
San Giovanni, all of which date from the eleventh century.
To the twelfth century may be assigned San Matteo (the
Doria Chapel), much altered as to its interior during the
Cinquecento period. To the thirteenth, the Western
façade of the cathedral, and to the fourteenth, the grand
desecrated church of San Agostino.
The interior of the transepts, crossing and choir of the
Cathedral belong to the Early Renaissance epoch, as do the
sumptuous chapel of St John in the Cathedral, and the
churches of the Annunziata, San Ambrogio, Sta Maria.
Carignano, San Siro, and Sta Maria delle Vigne.
In addition to these, there is a multitude of minor
churches in Genoa in the Later Revived Classical taste,
which are interesting to the student for the originality and
versatility displayed in their plans.* San Luca and San
Giorgio are perhaps the best and most pleasing of these
churches, consisting as they do merely of a domed centre
with shallow recesses for altars. The larger Revived Italian
churches which I have enumerated are mostly provided
with the dome, a feature to which the style owes some of
its greatest beauties.
In churches with a central dome, nothing can be finer
than the arches so situated, bounding the vault of the
nave and the other limbs of the cross. Of those I have seen,
besides the Genoese examples, I may name a number in
* The Genoese churches of the Revived Italian are of great mag-
nificence, and generally of good proportion. The inscription, “ Una de
septem ecclesiis," seemed to meet my eyes oftener than seven times,
though I will not exactly vouch for its more frequent occurrence.
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Rome, San Alessandro at Milan, the cathedrals at Brescia
and Vercelli, San Gaudenzio at Novara, and the Umilata
at Pistoja. Nor must we forget such early essays in dome
construction as the cathedrals of Pisa, Siena, and Parma.
In short, wherever there is a dome, this beauty will be
found, and provided the proportions are well preserved,
which is not difficult, there is no position in which the
round arch appears to greater advantage. It is common to
make the pier, in the nave of a Revived Italian church,
consist of a single column, with its own proper entablature,
from which spring the arches. A convent near Genoa offers
a very good example, the columns being of white marble,
and the order, if memory serves aright, Doric. This, or the
Tuscan, is best suited to the purpose ; as the height of a
Corinthian capital would add much to the heaviness,
which, in any case, is far from pleasing.
In the Genoese churches of this epoch, the pier is also
frequently composed of two columns, standing free from
each other in the direction of the nave, and supporting an
entablature, from which rise the arches. By this the heavy
appearance of the last is avoided, but it seems fitter for the
front of a building than for a range in the interior of a
church. If the longitudinal and transverse diameter of a
pier be unequal, the latter ought to be the greater, both on
mechanical principles and for optical effect. This was dis-
covered and acted upon at an early date of Gothic archi-
tecture; for wherever the column is doubled, the line
which would pass through the two is almost invariably at
right angles with the direction of the arcade. We find,
however, some pleasing examples among the Genoese
churches : I may notice San Siro and Sta Maria delle
Vigne as two of the best. This arrangement prevails in the
IO
THE JOURNEY: GENOA
Saoli Palace, one of the finest specimens of composition in
Genoa. The order seems immaterial : even the Ionic,
which seldom harmonises well with the arch, here appears
in character.
Another plan is to make the arch spring at once from
the capital of the column, or from imposts without any
capital at all, and crown the whole either with an entab-
lature or a cornice. This system is at least free from incon-
sistency; but instead of a combination, it should be called
a separation of the two principles : it belongs, in fact,
rather to the next class than to this.
The Annunziata at Genoa, from the designs of Gia-
como della Porta, is a fine example of the Classical Revival
(1587). Here the cylindrical columns, fluted with red
marble, are Composite of a very pronounced type. The
Tuscan is often used. When the Corinthian is selected, it
ought not to be very lofty in its proportions, and the
capital may be spread out more than is usual in classical
specimens. The arrangement of churches in the classical
style admits of great variety. Some are simple domes,
having merely small recesses for the porch and the altar.
Others are cruciform, with a large dome at the intersection,
and smaller ones over the aisles. Of this description is
Galeazzo Alessi's Carignano (1552-1603), one of the hand-
somest, if not one of the most gorgeous, churches in Genoa.
In this instance the limbs of the cross are of equal length,
except that the eastern one has a projecting apse, and the
aisles, which come up to the respective fronts, are conse-
quently square, and also make the whole building a square,
broken only by the apse. Each of the aisles is covered with a
hemispherical dome. The massiveness of the central piers,
the simple construction of the vaulting (which rises im-
II
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
СТОИ
02
mediately from the entablature above the arches) and the
boldness of the cornices, gives the interior a fine effect.
San Ambrogio has aisles consisting of two squares, each
crowned (internally) with a dome; but here there is
a clerestory, and consequently the vaulting has lateral
cells. This church, which owes much of its beauty to the
richness of the marbles with which it is ornamented, has
a square-ended eastern limb, and the manner in which the
three windows of its upper storey are made to fit into the
semicircular arch of the vault is quite a chef-d'ouvre.
No less beautiful is the altar-piece, constructed in the wall,
of four attached Corinthian columns.
The Italian Renaissance is a movement particularly
worthy of study, being of the same kind as the Gothic
Revival of our time. The circumstances under which it
rose, it is true, were very different. The state of architec-
ture in Italy, previous to the Renaissance, though un-
satisfactory in some respects, was vastly better than in
England at the beginning of the last century. The Roman
style, moreover, upon which the Italians fell back, had
never attained to any such perfection as had the Gothic
in later times. Still it was, perhaps, more than any other,
the style of the country, and had so far advanced as to
show that it was capable of further development. The
fault which ruined the Renaissance appears to have been
that which was, fifty years ago, so common amongst
English Gothic architects, the following too closely the
forms of ancient architecture. Some of the earlier build-
ings of the Renaissance, notably the facade of the Certosa
at Pavia and the north porch of Sta Maria at Bergamo,
are treated with as much freedom, and perhaps as much
beauty of design and detail, as most Gothic buildings.
12
THE JOURNEY: GENOA
OV
It is hardly fair to judge the Renaissance by the build-
ings erected in England under its influence. It did not
much affect us until its halcyon period had gone by. It
was originated by a people with whom we had not much
in common. If the Italians had not been successful in
naturalising the Gothic style, the northern races could
not be expected to be so expert as the Italians in their
own style. Still, France contains some very beautiful ex-
amples of it,* and Germany one of unrivalled magnifi-
cence in the castle at Heidelberg. In churches, however, it
must be admitted that the architects of the Renaissance
were not always successful. There are few churches in the
Renaissance style from which much can be learned, and
none which can be compared with the best Gothic ones.
It was my intention to have devoted a chapter to the
cathedrals and churches of the Italian Cinquecento and
Later Renaissance in this volume, but exigencies of space
and the impossibility, not to say impropriety, of epitomis-
ing an epoch in the history of Architecture, whose charm
and fascination have tempted one student after another to
reach the heart of its mystery, decided me to defer its
more mature consideration for the present.
The territory of the ancient republic of Genoa is the
narrow strip of land between the mountains and the sea,
extending from Genoa on the north to the Gulf of Spezia
on the south. This district is some seventy or eighty miles
in length by a few only in breadth. It was never extended
far inland ; the Genoese preferring maritime enterprise,
and distant settlements in Cyprus and Asia.
The railway journey from Genoa to Spezia, skirting as
it does the Mediterranean, is beyond description beautiful.
* Vide, The Cathedrals and Churches of Northern France.
13
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
I saw it partly in the glory of noontide and partly by sun-
set when the Carrarese. Mountains were flushed with pink,
and shone above the lower dark green hills against the
blazing sky, while the sea, gleaming with sapphire, and the
lovely bay made up the prospect. The road from Genoa to
Spezia is, I think, the finest I ever had the happiness to
travel. Nor was it devoid of ecclesiological interest, em-
bracing as it did the typical Genoese churches of San
Salvatore near Chiavari, Levanto and Monterosso, the
votive church of Sta Maria di Suviore, near the last-named,
and the small ruined chapel of San Pietro at Porto Venere.
Spezia appeared to have nothing of architectural interest,
so I spent the morning of my stay there in a visit to the
Saturday market, and in enjoying the grand marine views
from the great tree-planted space which lies between the
town and the sea, until it was more than fully time to
catch the train for Pisa.
Everybody has read of the irreverent exclamation of the
Western youth, whose early education had been neglected,
when his teacher first showed him the letter A. I experi-
enced something of the same feeling when, on a bright
sunny morning towards the end of October, I first saw the
Leaning Tower of Pisa as the train from Spezia swept
past that quarter of the city where, together with the
Cathedral and the Baptistery, it stands in calm and
dignified repose. This piece of architectural eccentricity
was, and I suppose, still is, one of the commonplaces of
geography, and is put in the same educational state-room
with the wall of China and the Great Tun of Heidelberg.
I cannot recall the time when its form was not familiar to
me from models under glass-cases in "Early Victorian "
drawing-rooms, and from wood-cuts in the Mirror and the
14
THE JOURNEY: PISA
1
Penny and Saturday Magazines ; and now, here it was,
bodily before me; no vision, no delusion, but a very de-
cided fact, with a most undeniable inclination on one side ;
so much so, that a nervous person would not sleep soundly
in the house that stands under its lee, on a windy night.
This singular structure, whose first sight is quite terrific
and exceeds expectation, is simply a campanile, or bell-
tower, appurtenant to the Cathedral, as is the very fre-
quent custom in Italy. It is not merely quaint, but
beautiful ; that is, take away the quaintness, and the beauty
will remain. It is built of white marble, wonderfully fresh
and pure, when we remember that seven centuries have
swept over it. I will not describe it, nor give its dimensions,
for these may be found in every guide-book and nearly
every volume of travels. There is, I believe, no doubt of
the real history of this tower. To one who has been on the
spot, and observed the spongy nature of the soil, as evi-
denced by the slight subsidence of portions of the adjacent.
Cathedral, there is really no room for argument or doubt.
The foundation ground gave way during the progress.
of the building, and the architect completed his work in
the direction thus accidentally given to it. Accordingly,
we find in the construction of the upper part, that the.
weight is disposed in such a manner as to support the:
equilibrium.*
* M. Fulchiron, an intelligent and accomplished French traveller
of the early part of the last century, maintained that the inclination
was the result of design and not of accident.
Though the walls at the base are 13 feet thick, and at the top about
half as much, they are constructed throughout of marble. The entire
height of this celebrated monument is 183 feet, but the ascent is easy
by a stair in the walls, and the visitor hardly perceives the inclination
till he reaches the top, and from the lower edge of the gallery look su
"down" along the shaft receding to its base.
15
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
YTY
Upon the whole, it is a very elegant structure; and the
ensemble is so pleasing, that-like Alexander's wry neck-
it might well bring leaning into fashion among all the
towers in Christendom.
“ It was a surprise to me to find this “ Leaning Tower'
in a grave, retired place, apart from the general resort,
and carpeted with smooth green turf. But, the group of
buildings, clustered on and about this verdant carpet :
comprising the Tower, the Baptistery, the Cathedral, and
the Church of the Campo Santo : is perhaps the most re-
markable and beautiful in the whole world ; and from
being clustered there, together, away from the ordinary
transactions and details of the town, they have a singularly
venerable and impressive character. It is the architectural
essence of a rich old city, with all its common life and
common habitations pressed out, and filtered away." *
At first it may seem somewhat remarkable that this
group of Pisan buildings should have impressed an English-
man in this way, because one would have thought that the
recollections of our old English cathedral closes would
rather have prepared our great novelist for the situation
of these edifices. Salisbury, Wells, and Lichfield Cathedrals
are nearly as securely removed from the bustle and ordinary
life of cities to which they belong as the buildings at Pisa.
One may suppose, therefore, that Dickens' Continental
experiences had for the time being led him into temporary
forgetfulness of this peculiarity of so many of our English
cathedrals. In early times there can be little doubt that
nearly all cathedrals were planted in closes or enclosures,
The reader is referred to an interesting communication, on the sub-
ject of the leaning of this campanile at Pisa, from Professor Goodyear,
to the Architect of 19th August 1910.
* Dickens, Pictures from Italy.
1119
16
THE JOURNEY: PISA
but as the inhabitants of the cities increased, these open
spaces became built upon. This was so generally the case
on the Continent, where it was often found difficult to
enlarge the walls and fortifications of the towns, and then
the only way of providing for a growing population was to
build over the spaces left within the city.
One of the great peculiarities of this group at Pisa is its
remarkable unity. Although they contain work of every
date, from the eleventh to the sixteenth century, yet their
general effect is that of a series of buildings, all erected at
the same time, and in the same style. A little study of their
details shows this not to be the case, but there is a harmony
about all the latter alterations and additions which to any
one not acquainted with architectural detail would lead to
the idea that the whole group of buildings had been erected
at the same time, and had presented pretty nearly the
same aspect which they now do for seven hundred years.
This probably arises from the fact that a kind of Classical
feeling pervades Italian architecture of every date, as will
be seen by looking at the upper portions of the Baptistery
which, although Gothic as to detail and date, yet from the
exclusive use of the round arch and a certain horizontal
treatment in the arrangement of the various stories, the
building has at first sight quite a Romanesque character.
The Teuton influence was nowhere stronger and more
powerful than in Tuscany, during the eleventh, twelfth and
thirteenth centuries. The union between Roman civilisation
and Teuton solidity and clumsiness, softened by Christian
feelings, developed by degrees into a finished and well-
pronounced style of architecture, and architects began to
work according to a general standard, embracing Roman
and Greek symmetry and an accurate appreciation of the
17
2
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
proportions of details without sacrificing their spiritual
individuality.
Whatever the merits of the products of France, Ger-
many and Spain may have been, they are certainly inferior
to those of the two rivalling schools of Florence and Pisa,
which were both equally animated and guided by the spirit
of veneration for the Antique. The Florentines cultivated
elegance, while the Pisans were sterner, more correct, and
entered with greater depth into the spirit of Christianity,
and, therefore, gained a well-deserved victory over their
rivals in Romanesque architecture. The most beautiful
and remarkable product of this style is beyond question the
Cathedral of Pisa. The inscription gives us the exact date
of the construction, which was commenced during the
eleventh century, and not completed until the beginning of
the twelfth. Cicognara, Agincourt, Chapuy, Gally-Knight,
Morona, and others, have given us illustrations and de-
scriptions of this most exquisite and finished edifice in the
Italo-Romanesque style. The date is recorded in the follow-
ing lines :
“ Anno quo Christus de Virgine natus ab illo
Transierant mille deciesque sex tresque subinde
Pisani cives celebri virtute potentes
Istius ecclesiæ primordia dantur inisse.”
Pisa was at that period one of the most important com-
mercial towns-the mightiest naval power in the Western
part of the Mediterranean, and mistress of Sardinia.
After a victory over the Saracens in the waters of
Palermo, the citizens of Pisa resolved to construct their
Cathedral out of the booty. Like the Cathedral of St Mark
at Venice, it was not only to be a monument of religious
piety but, at the same time, to serve as a lasting record of
18
THE JOURNEY: PISA
the sanguinary triumph of prowess and courage. This
double purpose, half pagan, half Christian, was distinctly
expressed in the mixed style which was half Roman, half
ecclesiastic. The walls of the Cathedral served as a kind of
civic archive, recording memorable incidents in bold
inscriptions.
We find here also the names of two architects, of whom
which led Vasari and other archæologists to commit the
error of assigning Dulichium as the birthplace of the
architect, and to assert that the church was built in the
Byzantine style. The name of the other architect is given
in these lines :
“ Hoc opus eximium, tam miruin, tam pretiosum
Rainaldus prudens operator et ipse
Magister constituit mire, solerter et ingeniose.”
Rainald, in spite of the additional Latin “us," is a
thoroughly Teuton name-Reinhold.*
The inscription referring to him is on the façade which
was probably finished after the Cathedral had been com-
pleted, and goes far to prove that Rainaldus was the second
master, and decorated the building planned by his pre-
decessor.
If the architect of Pisa Cathedral was a Greek, he evi-
dently did not show his nationality in the design for that
church, as the long nave and aisles, deep transepts and
in character. The building, in fact, features the old basilica
of St Paul's extra muros at Rome, with the addition of a
developed choir and cupola at the intersection of the four
* We meet with a German saint of that name in Westphalia, one
of the old churches in Dortmund being dedicated to him.
19
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
seen in
arms, neither of which features have any Greek character
about it.
There is a far greater amount of originality about Pisa
Cathedral than is to be seen in any other church of its
date, and its proportions were clearly carefully studied.
Though very imposing, it is not a very large church, its
extreme length being little over 300 feet.
The generality of visitors to Pisa confine their operations
to what is comprised within a few acres, and is embraced
with one glance of the eye—those four buildings, “ so
fortunate,” as Forsyth, whose strictures upon Gothic
are generally too harsh, and show the bias of a mind too
deeply tinged with Classical ideas to be just to mediæval
art, has well remarked, “in their solitude and their
society”-the Cathedral, the Campo Santo, the Baptistery
and the Leaning Tower. But the ecclesiologist will go
further afield-to San Paulo a Ripa, the Cathedral in
miniature, with a most grand and solemn interior; to the
curious octagonal San Sepolcro; to Sta Caterina and San
Michel in Borgo, whose exquisitely beautiful façades are
especially interesting, as showing how admirably the
builders adapted the Lombard fashion of an arcaded front
to the style prevalent in the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries; to San Frediano and San Pierino, and a little
further afield to the wonderful old church of San Pietro in
Grado, a simple parallelogram, with an apse at the ex-
tremity of the nave and both aisles. Here, as elsewhere in
the places at which I sojourned, strangers seem to be at
home, and the natives to be exiles. The former amuse
themselves with the imposing monuments of past greatness,
but the Italians must look upon these much as the re-
presentative of a decayed and impoverished family looks
20

PISA: THE CATHEDRAL, BAPTISTERY AND LEANING TOWER.
Pisa : STA. MARIA DELLA SPINA.
THE JOURNEY: PISA
upon the portraits of his ancestors who were powerful and
rich. Indifferent eyes may value them as works of art, but
to him they have another meaning, and address other
feelings. They are not pictures, but symbols ; not forms,
but memorials.
Sunday, 24th October, the Festival of St Raphael the
Archangel, was enjoyably spent at Pisa in attendance at
Divine service in the Duomo and other churches, and in
adding vastly to my store of information upon that lovely
variety of the Romanesque, to which the term Pisan has
been so appropriately applied.
The bells in the Leaning Tower began to ring about
nine o'clock for the Chapter Offices, * and on strolling into
the Cathedral I found the choir prepared for High Mass
and several fine Graduales placed open on the lecterns.
An Italian cathedral or parish-church choir is generally
accessible, and at Pisa that morning I roamed about the
stalls at will, admiring the wonderful “ marqueterie” of
their seats and backs, and turning over the leaves of the
Office Books which had been opened at the Mass, the
music being, to my great joy, that old favourite, the
“ Missa de Angelis.”
Returning to the grassy space surrounding the Duomo,
I waited while a long procession of white-robed seminarists
issued from their college adjoining the Campo Santo, and
entered the Cathedral with them, when they immediately
began to sing the Office of Terce. This, as well as the sub-
sequent Chapter Mass, was sung to the Gregorian Chant
without the accompaniment of the organ, which, how-
* There are seven bells in this campanile, so arranged that the
heavier metal may counteract the leaning. One of them, called Pas-
quaveccia, was tolled when criminals were taken to execution.
21
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
ever, broke in at intervals very agreeably. During the pre-
liminary Office the canons dropped into their stalls singly
or in pairs, and I shall never forget the charming picture
made by a little group of them as they stood for a few
moments in conversation, with the sunshine of a soft
autumn morning glinting through the stained-glass
windows upon their scarlet and white robes. And when
they were all assembled in their stalls, with the surpliced
Schola Cantorum in front of them, the cantors in white and
gold copes at the lectern, the priests at the altar, and the
incense curling upwards before the grand mosaic figure
of Our Lord in Majesty on the conch of the apse, the
mise en scène was, I thought, perfect. A few visitors who, in
all probability knew little of what was going on, and
cared less, were strolling about, quite unchecked, but a
poor old woman and myself appeared to be the only people
taking any interest in the solemn offices of the Church.
At Pisa there are two plain ambones or pulpits at the
sides of the choir, and from the northern one the Gospel
was sung by the deacon facing southwards; the sub-deacon
standing at his right hand, and two acolytes bearing
lighted tapers. There are several customs peculiar to Pisa
Cathedral; for instance, at the sedilia the deacon occu-
pied the central seat, with the celebrant at his left hand on
the west side, and the sub-deacon at his right. The sub-
deacon when reading the Epistle was attended by one
acolyte.
candles are extinguished with a sponge, and several other
ritual peculiarities might be quoted.
By half-past ten the Morning Offices in the Duomo were
22
THE JOURNEY: PISA
selves of their choir habits, which they deposited in lockers
ranged against the walls of the nave aisles, enjoying little
chats while they did so, I visited several churches, in some
of which a Mass con accompagnamente d'organo, i.e., a
Low Mass during which, at intervals, a piece is played on
the organ, was in progress; but this service cannot compare
in grandeur or solemnity with the “ People's Mass” in
Germany. Among the churches into which I looked were
the great one of St Francis, lately rescued from desecration
and desuetude, and remarkable for the very striking and
beautiful Pointed Gothic reredos by Tommaso Pisano, of
which' an illustration is given in the chapter on Sculp-
ture; and my favourite one of San Paolo a Ripa d'Arno,
where, during my visit on the previous evening the parish
priest had courteously presented me with a table of ser-
vices, a copy of which I here subjoin :
Domani, 24 Ottobre 1909, nella insigne e monumentale
Chiesa di S. Paolo a Ripa d'Arno sarà celebrata la consueta festa
in onore di MARIA SS. DEL ROSARIO.
Vi sarà la S. Messa alle ore 6, alle 7, alle 8, alle 9, alle 10 e
alle II.
Alle ore 7 . . Comunione generale.
9 9 10
Messa in canto corale.
„ „, 11.30 . Novena in suffragio dei defunti.
» » 17
Rosario Breve discorso-Funzione
Solenne-Benedizione Eucaristica
-Laudi.
Indulgenza plenaria, speciale per la Chiesa di San Paolo a
Ripa d'Arno dal 18 Ottobre fino al 30 Novembre.
Towards five o'clock the sky, which had hitherto been
clear, suddenly became overcast; the mountains bounding
the plain on the north and east sides of the city were
veiled in mist; the grand group of the Duomo, Baptistery
* 5 o'clock p.m.
23
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
and Leaning Tower, stood out white from a background
of deep blue rain-cloud ; the leaves dropped in showers
from the trees in the little piazza before San Paolo a
Ripa ; the white marble Capella della Spina on the em-
bankment of the Arno was invisible for a cloud of dust;
and some youths in eight-oars, attired in the full aquatic
costume of tightly-fitting white vests, ditto ditto unmen-
tionables, socks and shoes, were drenched to the skin before
they could reach the shelter of the Ponte Solferino.
On the way from Pisa to Siena the excursion from
Poggibonzi to San Gemignano amply repaid the trouble,
the drive through the Fori torrent and the ascent to the
town abounding in beauty. San Gemignano, perched aloft
with its thirteen towers, might be the original of many
a quaint little city pictured by Umbrian artists as a back-
ground to a Holy Family, or the Madonna rising above
the earth on a sky of cherubs. The situation, in short, is
magnificent, overlooking a wide sweep of fair country en-
circled by mountains. As to the frescoes which cover the
walls of the Duomo and the Church of San Agostino,
they exceeded all my expectations. But the readers of
Crowe and Cavalcaselle become familiar in detail with the
double series in either aisle of the former church by Berna
da Siena, Ascanio and Bartolo di Fredi. It is strange, how-
ever, that these two distinguished critics, though speaking
of the frescoes as injured, do not mention that they have
been “ fearfully and wonderfully” restored, with a reck-
lessness more tragic than utter ruin.
Bartolo's works have fared far worse. But even as they
are, the interior of the old church glows with a dim rich-
ness from the varied colour and bold grouping of these
once beautiful designs. The frescoes of Gozzoli in San
.
24
THE JOURNEY: SIENA
S
Agostino are amongst his earliest and best works. The com-
position selected by the Arundel Society, “ St Augustine
Teaching at Rome ” is hardly the most pleasing, though.
symmetrical and full of character. I must own to a pre-
dilection for the frescoes in the Riccardi Chapel at Florence,
in spite of the grave authorities quoted above ; but for
simple earnestness of feeling, artistic arrangement of sub-
ject and pleasing colour, this history of St Augustine is
rarely beautiful. The Pisa frescoes, though more powerful,
are coarser.
Siena, like many other Etruscan cities, is situated on the
summit of a hill, the steep sides of which rise abruptly from
a plain. The approach to it from Pisa on a fine summer's.
evening must be extraordinarily beautiful, for along the
valley are numerous cornfields, thickly planted with mul-
berry- and fig-trees, from one to the other of which the
vines hang in graceful festoons, until turning a corner,
the city rises up suddenly to view, with its numerous
towers, turrets and bell-cotes overtopped by the lofty
campanile of the Cathedral standing out in sharp relief
against the setting sun.
Arriving at Siena-a name illustrious in the history of
Italian art-from the north, I first saw there the effect
of many coloured marbles in the façade of a cathedral. If
the eye of a traveller has been accustomed to nothing but.
our colourless buildings, it will be a moment of strange
amazement to him when he first faces the gorgeous façade
of the Siena Duomo. Still more strange will be the interior
to him, with its great pillars striped with dark and light
marble. It is a new and unaccustomed effect, and as such
is apt to be at once harshly and unfavourably criticized
by our countrymen. It would be well if they would
25
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
endeavour, in judging of foreign buildings and customs, to
leave their insular ideas behind with their teapots, and
found their criticisms on data arising from the facts and
materials before them. It was, no doubt ridiculous, half a
century ago, before that wonderful revolution in domestic
taste took place, when a country squire, returning from
Italy to his estate in the Midland counties of England,
appended to his Elizabethan mansion a Palladian portico,
or lined his hall with Italian marbles ; but it is just as
ridiculous when an Englishman stands before such chefs-
d'ouvre as the façades of Orvieto and Siena, and rails at
them because they are not in the style of Salisbury or
Wells, or that their campanili, windows, and other details
present so strange a departure from those of Gloucester and
Exeter.
Perpetual summer weather at the end of October-not-
withstanding the occurrence of the proverbially stormy St
Simon and St Jude's Day“to which Schiller in his Willian
Tell makes allusion-with a sweet, crisp air, rendered
Siena the most delightful of halting-places. The streets
were cool and shady, and the afternoon breeze was re-
freshing for a walk within or without the old walls, when the
sunset cast a warmer glow over the rich landscape the city
dominates. To be within the walls is not to be within
Siena necessarily, for large tracts of garden or olive-
ground often stretch between the wall and the height on
which the houses clamber rather than stand. The gates are
all below or on a slope of the city, which on two sides is
defended by great bastions of sandstone cliff, on which
again the walls are planted. The view of Siena from the
valley on the west side is most quaint and striking, with the
campanile of the Duomo crowning the very summit, and
1
26
THE JOURNEY: SIENA
seeming to catch the clouds. So high does Siena lie that in
looking out to the mountains eastward the eye passes over
the valleys and dwells with delight on the wave-like forms
of height after height crowned by tower, castle or convent,
till changing colour and broken outline merge into the
blue mist of the far-off mountain ranges.
The services in the Duomo on the Festival of St Simon
and St Jude, though but scantily attended, were carried
out with much pomp and fairly good musical accompani-
ment. I assisted at the First Vespers at three o'clock on the
eve, and at the Chapter Mass on the morning of the day
dedicated to those apostles. There are three organs in
Siena Cathedral-one in either aisle of the choir, and a
third in the south transept. The crimson copes worn at the
First Vespers of the Feast were magnificent, the officiant
assuming a plain white mitre, one of the ritual customs
peculiar to this Cathedral, as it is to those of Orvieto, and
Milan, and in all probability to others. The stalls in the
choir behind the high altar were well filled with canons
most of whom remained at the conclusion of Compline to
chant the early Morning Offices of St Simon and St Jude's
Day by anticipation-a process which occupied a consider-
able time. The Gregorian chanting was, on the whole, very
good, and, as usual in Italian churches, unaccompanied,
but at the conclusion of every Gloria Patri, here, as else-
where, the organist indulged in a little skirmishing on the
flute and other stops of the choir organ; and, before the
words “et in sæcula sæculorum" had left the lips of the
singers, dashed off into a brilliant interlude. This is a very
unpleasant, not to say irritating, trick, and, as far as I am
aware, one peculiar to Italy. .
From Siena onwards I entered on a new and most
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
interesting country. The deep sylvan valleys of Tuscany
at this season were about to don the richest autumnal
hues of varied foliage. Oak, chestnut, maple, hawthorn
and wild cherry mingled their tints, ranging from
palest yellow to scarlet and bright purple, and across
the head of every vale stood up the massive ranges of dis-
tant hills, of deepest and loveliest blue. So I passed on till
in a bright noontide my train ran into the station at
Orvieto, which on its towering cliffs stood up against a
cobalt sky. A few minutes, and the funicular railway lands
me at the summit of the declivity, and as the omnibus
from the Palace Hotel conveys me—its solitary passenger-
along the country road between the terminus and the
town, how the heart leaps with gladness as the bright
figured pinnacles of the steel-grey Cathedral are dis-
cerned gleaming up some side street-how the pulse
quickens as the vehicle skirts its south side and the
whole gorgeous western façade blazes out upon the sight.
And if there ever was an object of which all this is true, it is
the front of the Cathedral at Orvieto. Judged by the strict
rules of architectural effect, its shape would perhaps be
designated as too stiffly symmetrical and unbroken ; but
it is a very miracle of art in graven work and colour.
The first thought in Orvieto, as at Pisa and Siena, at
Milan and Lucca, is of its Duomo. I was, of course, often
there ; for when there was nothing else immediately
occupying the attention, I could repair to this august
temple and find not only in its architecture, but in those
frescoes which cover every available space on the walls
and vaults of its transeptal chapels, subjects for study
which are inexhaustible.
There are churches, too, in Orvieto : solemn old
IS
28

ORVIETO CATHEDRAL, FROM THE NORTH-WEST.
SIENA CATHEDRAL, FROM THE SOUTH-WEST.
THE JOURNEY: ORVIETO
S
Romanesque San Lorenzo; San Giovenale of the wonder-
ful but fragmentary fourteenth-century frescoes ; San
Andrea, with a short, lofty, two-bayed Gothic sanctu-
ary, in the German “hall” style, curiously sand-
wiched between a mediocre Cinquecento nave and a
nondescript choir, and a curious twelve-sided campanile
of the eleventh century, but all so hemmed in by houses,
and so spoilt by Renaissance vulgarity, as to leave the
visitor in doubt as to what its original character could have
been ; San Francesco, with a grand Early Gothic west
front, some traces of the same style in the exterior walls
on the north side, a charming Renaissance belfry featuring
that of the Duomo, but more elegantly contoured, and a
fine spacious interior, completely renovated in the Cor-
inthian style ; and a few others which it is needless to
particularise.
It was All-Hallows-tide, but the sun was shining so
warmly, that in England it would have passed for June,
and when on the morning of that great Feast-Day of the
Church I walked to the Campo Santo (about a mile or so
from the walls on the western side of the city), there was a
freshness in the air which, as Madame de Staël says, “ pro-
duces something of melody on the senses.” At the Campo
Santo on this ist of November numbers were very busy,
not only decorating the graves of lost ones with flowers,
which were being transported thither from the town in
a variety of ways, but imbedding in them small lamps of
an ecclesiastical character, whose embellishment in the
several smiths' shops of Orvieto on the previous day had
aroused my curiosity. At night the effect of these long lines
of lamps viewed from the city walls in the deep stillness
produced a most solemn effect. There was a tumble-down
29
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
old chapel in this cemetery at Orvieto, octagonal in shape
and with an apsidal choir, but of a no very high order of
Renaissance. Apparently it is disused, for I never saw a
church interior in a more shameful state of neglect and
dirt. Truly it was in the very last stage of degradation.
Better is it to pull such places down altogether than allow
them to sink so low as this. But I found something to in-
terest me even here. The altar, or what was an altar, stands
between the octagon and the choir, from which it is cut off
by a wall with a door in it on either side, and over this
was a decrepit organ. Passing from the octagon into the
choir, which was stalled all round its apse, I looked up to
the organ, whose back had a painting of the Virgin and
Child, with two saints upon it, and on the panels of the
gallery front I read the intonations of the eight modes to
the Dixit Dominus (one of the Psalms at Vespers on Sun-
day); the Tonus Peregrinus to the In Exitu Israel ;
various tones for the Magnificat; and melodies for the
Te Lucis ante terminum, besides seven modes for the
Benedicamus Domino and the In Manus tuas Domine, for
Compline. Clearly this forlorn-looking structure belonged
to some dispersed religious order. On the altar at the
(ecclesiologically) west end of the choir, and therefore
under the aforesaid decrepit organ, some tattered missals
were strewn about, one being dated 1739, and in the
middle of the choir was a revolving lectern with a Graduale
and an antiphonarium on its sloping desk. Dust, dirt and
cobwebs reigned supreme, and a little company of black-
beetles, who had been holding a festival among themselves in
undisturbed enjoyment, scuttled off to their hiding-places
on my approach. I also disturbed a fine brown rat or two.
During my stay in Orvieto I attended most of the
30
THE JOURNEY: ORVIETO
Chapter Offices in the Cathedral. There was always a large
body of canons present in those stalls whose intarsia work
forms, next to the frescoes, the chief object of attraction
to the generality of visitors, and the ceremonial was digni-
fied, but the congregations were absolutely nil. At High
Mass on All Saints' Day, when I had looked forward to
the grandest embellishment a church can have-a vast
congregation-an old woman, a cat, and myself com-
prised it. Puss was being fondled, prior to the commence-
ment of the solemnities, on a chair by an acolyte; released
from these endearments she walked with a stately step and
tail erect down the broad unbenched nave, paused now
and then for a parenthetic lick or scratch, and finally
fine and warm, hung within the great western door, whose
valves were thrown aside to their utmost capacity. A
small choir of men--half-a-dozen or so—“executed” the
music in a little gallery (in which was a little organ-the
great organ in the north transept was silent throughout my
visit); and of their performance it is only just to say that if
their piano passages were not very marked, there was no
mistake whatever about their fortissimos. Through Introit,
Gloria, Credo and Offertorium they rushed at breathless
speed; decamped the instant Ite Missa est was pro-
nounced, and altogether conducted themselves as Dr
Johnson would have said, “but ill.”
Nor did matters improve at Solemn Vespers. Even puss
did not put in an appearance, the congregation compris-
ing my own exceedingly heretical self and some children,
who, knowing little about the ceremonies and caring less,
beguiled the time by leaning over the marble balustrades
between the nave and the sanctuary, trying on the
31
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
birettas of the clergy seated just within these enclosures,
stroking their copes, dozing, and quarrelling with one
another.
The Psalms were sung with great rapidity to one of those
florid—and it must be added, somewhat noisy-settings,
in which Italian church music of the eighteenth century
was so prolific. The composer of the Psalms sung at
Orvieto Cathedral that afternoon (the 110th, 11th, 112th
113th, 114th and 117th) was one Bianconi, concerning
whom I am unable to glean any particulars, and at the
conclusion of each Gloria Patri the baritone, who pos-
sessed a really fine voice, indulged in a grand “ embellish-
ment," quite in the style of Tamburini.
Perhaps one of the most beautiful settings of these
Sunday Psalms, in a style from which the Gregorian ele-
ment has been wholly eliminated, is that in C by Mozart.
I subjoin the opening bars of the Dixit Dominus :
Admirers of the Gregorian and a capella styles will,
however, give the preference to such settings found in
Proske’s Musica Divina, on account of their greater
severity and Church-like character. Some of these Psalms
are arranged alternately in verses to the ancient tones and
falsi bordoni, which constitute a kind of lace-work, if I may
so speak, to the plain chant, without detriment to its
severe character. Such are the settings by Giovanni Gab-
Tieli, Ludovico Viadana and Guiseppe Bernabei, two of
whom flourished during the second half of the sixteenth
and the other during the latter part of the seventeenth
century, while entirely in the a capella style are the
Psalms by Felice Anerio, Bernardino Nanini and Ruggiero
Giovanelli, all sixteenth- and seventeenth-century men.
32
THE JOURNEY
VESPERAE DE DOMINICA.
NO1
Von
W. A. MOZART.
1. Dixit.
Allegro vivace.
Tuiti

Sopran.
Di . xit
Tutti
Do-mi-nus Do. nino
me -
0:
.
Alt.
U
Di . xit
Tulli
Do-mi-nus Do. mi.no .me
.
o: se , de a
Tenor.
Di . xit
Dominus Do-mi-no me.
0:
Tulli
Bass.
Di . xit
Do-mi-nus Do. mi.no
me.
0: se . de a
of
11
ONE
Pianoforte
Ped'.
to Ped.
• Ped.
of
Ped.
to

se
: de a dextris
me
.
is,se - de a
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tris me
dex-tris,
a
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ISL
Uhr
se
de a
dextris
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-
is, se - des
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e
-
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marc.
**
MIR
WELL
Ped.
Ped.
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
o
a
The ceremonial at Magnificat was very imposing. The
officiating priest, who wore a cloth-of-gold cope and a plain
white mitre, and attended by two assistant priests simi-
larly vested, but without mitres, censed, not only the high
altar, but those at the end of the south aisle and the chapel
of the Bolsena Miracle, a solemn piece being played be-
tween each verse on the organ, to carry on time.
At sunset or thereabouts the bells in campanili and pic-
turesque bell-cotes, of which latter I saw a great many in this
part of Italy—some of them quite English-looking—are
set ringing, and a simple service, consisting of the recita-
tion of the Rosary, a Litany, and sometimes Benediction
of the Blessed Sacrament, takes place. Every evening I used
to attend one or more of these services, which are much
frequented, and chiefly by the poorer classes. Sometimes
there is no priest present at all, the responses being led by
an acolyte kneeling in front of one of the altars, and oc-
casionally by an old woman. The voices are very harsh and
unmusical, and heard as I often have heard them in some
great rambling church at the twilight hour, produced a
most unearthly effect. Occasionally, however, I have heard
some plaintive melodies to the incidental hymns, such as
the Ave Maris Stella, and the Litanies, but, on the who
public worship of Italy falls very far below that of Roman
Catholic Germany, both in vigour and devotional fervour.
It was about noon on All Souls' Day when I reached
Viterbo from Orvieto, and as I made my way up the main
street from the railway station to the inn, I met parties of
ecclesiastics and others returning from the various churches
after the Missæ pro defunctis.
Although Viterbo lies in a flat country, the streets are
sufficiently hilly to render it picturesque, and the numerous
34
THE JOURNEY: VITERBO
steeples-among which must be noted two beautiful cam-
panili, surmounted by short octagonal spires, a variety of
pretty bell-cotes, and some domes and steeples of the Re-
naissance age-confer an aspect of much architectural gran-
deur on the city. The Duomo has been sadly modernised -
by which term I mean that the Romanesque or Gothic work
has been supplanted by that of the Renaissance. The grand
Romanesque nave arcade is happily intact, but the deep ap-
sidal choir-one of the longest in this part of Italy I be-
lieve-has been shockingly painted like stage scenery, and
other atrocities--duly recorded in a pompous Latin inscrip-
tion over the choir arch-have been committed, which it
were idle to describe. But there is the Palace of the Popes
close by, a perfect mine of study to the architect and the
artist, with its great hall and picturesque passage-way with
unglazed windows over a bridge from which a delightful
panorama of the city can be obtained ; and the three noble
of steps between the nave and the choir ; San Giovanni
Zoccoli, a perfect gem of the later Romanesque, and Sta
Maria Nuova, another church of the same class, remarkable
for the pretty little external pulpit at the north-west angle
of the façade ; the huge aisleless church of the Franciscans
rich in canopied tombs of the best age-very remark-
able are those of the Popes Adrian V. and Clement IV.
and comparable in several respects with the somewhat
earlier one of Benedict XI. in San Domenico, Perugia; the
exquisite Pointed Gothic doorway of Sta Maria della
Salute, quite a gem, with charmingly foliaged capitals and
string-courses, round and twisted shafts, and jambs exhibit-
ing a wealth of minute sculpture in figures and leafage ;
the grand Renaissance Churches of Sta Maria della Quer-
.
35
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
cia,* and Sta Rosa, a large Revived Classical church, con-
taining the shrine of that saint.†
On one of the evenings of my sojourn in Viterbo, I was
sitting in this church when a nun drew aside a curtain
hanging behind an arch on the south side of the great cen-
tral area, with an effect that was almost theatrical, disclos-
ing to view the shrine behind a grille, amid a blaze of silver
lamps and tapers. Drawing near, I had a grand private view
of this shrine, which is in the form of a brass sarcophagus,
and of most elaborate Classical workmanship; at each cor-
ner of the sarcophagus is a large cherub, and through the
glass sides the effigy of Sta Rosa is seen recumbent.
Like the church of the Carignano at Genoa, Sta Rosa
in Viterbo is a Greek cross on plan, made however, on
paper, into a square by the chapels, which, formed within
the angles made by the arms, are covered with cupolas.
There is a dome over the central area, and an apsidal
choir.
Being All Souls' Day the churches were draped in black,
and in most of them a catafalque had been erected in the
middle of the choir, surrounded by mortuary lights,
their sombre apparellings being relieved with texts and
devices in silver ; some of the latter, representing skulls
and cross-bones, were of the most terrifying description, and
a
* No one interested in architecture of the Cinquecento should
omit to visit this church, which is a little over a mile from the city,
leaving it by the Porta Fiorentina.
of Butler, in his Lives of the Saints (vol. iii.), tells us that “from
her childhood, Sta Rosa addicted herself entirely to the practice of
mortification and assiduous prayer ; she was favoured with the gift of
miracles, and an extraordinary talent of converting the most hardened
sinners. She professed the third rule of St Francis, living always in the
house of her father at Viterbo, where she died in 1261." The oth of
March is assigned to her in the Roman Calendar.
36
THE JOURNEY: TOSCANELLA
seu
the words Hodie mihi, cras tibi, were of frequent occur-
rence.
The second day of my stay in Viterbo had been hope.
lessly wet, and as evening drew on and there seemed to be
no change in the weather, I became despondent at the idea
of having to abandon my long-looked-forward-to journey
to Toscanella, to which, I may say, there is no railway nor
public conveyance. However, as I was informed at the Alber-
go, where I had taken up my quarters, that the barometer
possessed by that establishment usually prognosticated the
weather inversely, I retired to bed very joyously upon
learning that the glass which had been very “high" all
day was now very “low”; so I was assured that such a
condition foretold a fine day on the morrow. Nor was I
deceived for, when the morrow arrived, the early Nov-
ember sun streaming through the jalousies of my chamber
window confirmed these expectations ; neither was there
a cloud in the sky that looked like mischief, or to induce
that unpleasant suspense so frequently attendant upon
pedestrian expeditions.
Possibly I might have found some conveyance going to
Toscanella had I run all over Viterbo in quest of it, but as
I had made up my mind to foot the journey, off I set,
to the astonishment of the “good people” of the inn, at
eight o'clock. After about three and a half hours' brisk
walking along a winding road through a flat, uninteresting
country, a sudden descent occurred in the road bounded
on either side by rocks. Presently this declivity ceased on
the right hand, and lo! on two hills there stood Toscanella
and thegreat Romanesque Church of San Pietro, a little way
out of the town gates as it is approached from Viterbo ; and
nestling at the foot of San Pietro's hill I could just discern
37
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the top of the ruined tower, which has been reared in such
curiously close proximity to the west front of Sta Maria
Maggiore. (See Illustration, page 246.)
Both these grand buildings at Toscanella speak of Italy
in an old world ; both now stand silent, yet, in their silence,
they still tell their tale of beauty and suffering. * Yet they
tell also of reverent loving hands, tending them with a
sacred care, requickening them almost with life, and leav-
ing them the mantle that best beseems their brown-stone
loveliness, their own native beauty, and their natural sur-
roundings of turf and tree and sky,
It was with the greatest reluctance that I tore myself
away from these two solemn old churches at Toscanella,
but there was the sixteen-mile walk back to Viterbo to be
faced. The sun was setting gloriously as I left the town, and
about half-past four the great round red ball had sunk down
below the horizon ere a dip in the road concealed Toscan-
ella from the view. There was no twilight, and in a very
short time it was night. The sky, though moonless, was
clear, and myriads of stars were twinkling with frosty
brightness in its deep blue vault, barely illuminating the
long sweeping outlines of hill and plain that stretched out
on either side of the road. Here and there a solitary farm-
house betrayed its locality by the glimmering light from its
windows; but with this exception, there were few tokens
of habitation, so that the return journey to Viterbo was a
very solitary oneindeed. There I arrived, a little over twelve
* Neither of these two grand churches is now used for worship. They
are kept, however, in repair by the Government but, as far as I could see,
had not been subjected to a very drastic restoration, excepting the façade
of San Pietro which, doubtless from its exposed situation, has required
it. A miserable little cathedral, in the worst phase of the Pseudo-Classical,
has been built in the town.
38
THE JOURNEY: ROME
CU
hours after my setting out, somewhat fatigued, but highly
delighted with the day's work.
My first view of the interior of St Peter's at Rome struck
a glorious picture upon the mind, which all the waves of
time can never effacem-not on account of its size, for that
did not impress itself so much upon me, but for the in-
comparably beautiful and sober tone of its colouration.
St Peter's is not alone grand, beautiful and vast-it is
absolutely sublime. But although you cannot analyse it like
Chartres or Troyes, you feel after a visit or two awestruck;
utterly overwhelmed by its immensity, its incomparable
stupendousness. Were it not for the general harmony of
style and just proportion, it would seem not a single gigan-
tic structure, but a mass of congregated and consecrated
buildings, all constituting a vast accumulation of the splen-
dours of art and the wonders of architecture the piled
offerings of the pride and piety of many ages and nations,
the mighty type and temple of a world's worship, tower-
ing towards God.
Lighter and less gorgeous than most Roman Catholic
cathedrals—I was surprised and charmed by the exquisite
blending, and the modest reticence of the tones of the mar-
bles and mosaics--the stillness and vastness of St Peter's
are even more profoundly impressive than the building it-
self, and amongst its countless altars, statues and pictures
(there is only one painted picture in St Peters, all the rest are in
mosaic) there are comparatively few objects offensive to the
taste, understanding and common-sense. I except, of course,
the works of Bernini and his disciples, marked as they
nearly all are by the wild extravagance and boisterous
strength with which this master seemed to boil over
bushy-headed saints, who look as though they had just
n
39
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
alighted from riding on a whirlwind and directing a storm
-angels in such a state of dishevelled discomposure, with
their drapery in such a crazy flutter of breezy folds, and
their very wing feathers so on end, one could almost believe
them escaped from some celestial insane asylum-these are
the only jarring elements. But the few monumental works
by Canova and Thorwaldsen gofar to make one forget these
sculptured atrocities.
To stand under the grand dome of St Peter's and look
up to the far shining of the pictured glory and mystery of
the Godhead is really a great and memorable thing. The
splendour of those wondrous mosaics, and all the elaborate
beauty of those wondrous ornaments, seem to strike down
upon you and dazzle you like the sun at noonday.
I had partaken of a petit premier déjeuner al fresco in front
of the mighty colonnades stretched out far on both sides,
as if embracing the vast arena they enclose, and in the
midst of which the beautiful fountains were throwing up
their myriad drops in the rich sunshine of a perfect morn-
ing, and had returned to the basilica so as to be in readi-
ness for the Divine Offices, when, as I was standing in
front of the altar of St Simon and St Jude, beneath which
lie the remains of Palestrina, the sound of an organ came
from the west end of the building and sent its tremulous
tide far down the magnificent nave, rounded, solemn and
sweet. The melodious food seemed to swell about me,
sensibly, almost visibly—to lift me from my feet and bear
me forth to the spot whence the sounds proceeded—the
Capella del Coro, an immense oblong building, correspond-
ing in some measure to our Morning Prayer Chapel in
St Paul's. Here I found a Missa pro Defunctis a "month's
mind” I suppose, being performed, with all the accessories
easure
40
THE JOURNEY: NARNI
of black and gold vestments, simple but of the richest de-
scription, incense and solemn Gregorian chanting. This was
succeeded by the Chapter Offices, Terce, Mass and Sext, all
adorned with suitable ritual and musical accompaniment,
after which I paid visits to several of the great basilicas,
Sta Maria Maggiore, San Giovanni Laterano and San
Clemente, San Lorenzo, Sta Agnese and Sta Maria in
Trastevere, all of which, now that Rome is traversed by
electric cars in every direction, can be reached from one to:
the other with the least possible loss of time. But with none
of these can I deal in this volume; suffice it to say that with
the simple, solemn grandeur of one and all I was deeply
impressed.*
From Rome I pass on through a land of hill and dale, of
olive and vine, till a deep wooded gorge is seen on the left,
and its bank on the right is crowned with walls and towers,
and “ Narni” is vociferated along the platform of the rail-
way-station. That milky stream then, threading the bottom
of the gorge, is the “sulphurous Nar”; and at the point
where the river, narrowing from the plain above, enters the
defiles are the grand ruins of Augustus's bridge, still strid-
ing half across with their massive broken arches.
This, with the hardly less picturesque mediæval bridge
at a lower level, the towering sides of the wooded glen, the
milky river below, and a convent, with its towers and roofs.
seen perched on a rock through one of the Roman arches,
11
From Narni, having passed the frowning battlements.
and towers of the old city on its hill, my train crossed the:
* As a souvenir of my visit to Rome, I give a view of the interior
of Sta Maria in Cosmedin, one of the most charming of the smaller
basilicas.
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
fertile plain to Terni. Much has been said and sung about
the celebrated falls; among other encomia, it has been de-
clared by Lord Byron that“ they are worth all the cascades
in Switzerland put together." I saw them under great ad-
vantages. There had been a slight shower during the ride
from Narni, and the autumnal leaves were yet glistening
with the drops; it was an afternoon almost cloudless, and
of tender genial sunshine, making it difficult to believe that
it was the gth of November. As I walked eastward up the
glen, and came within sight of the spray of the great fall,
a lovely rainbow spanned its ravine. Presently I stood fac-
ing it, my face wetted by its spray. And now, after some
spect to Lord Byron, this: that I prefer the most insignifi-
:cant cascade in Wales or Scotland to all this pomp of waters.
And why? Not that there is not here majesty and beauty:
not that anything could be mentioned as wanting, which
the most skilful designer of a waterfall could suggest; but
because, too manifestly, here is human design: because here,
as at Tivoli, the great Architect of Nature never placed the
fall where it is. We are in a land of hills and dales, but not
of gigantic cascades, both here and at Tivoli. This beauti-
ful glen, that sudden dip in the Tufa hills, were never in-
tended by the
"supernus Artifex
Mundum pugillo continens "*
for the theatre of such gigantic accidents of water as these.
* Vide the hymn of Venantius Fortunatus, Quem terra, portus, æthera
V. 3:
6 Beata Mater munere,
Cujus supernus Artifex
Mundum pugillo continens
Ventris sub arcâ clausus est."
42

ROME, INTERIOR OF STA, MARIA-IN-COSMEDIN.
EN
Assisi : INTERIOR OF THE THE LOWER CHURCH OF ST. FRANCIS.
THE JOURNEY: SPOLETO
The falls may be likened to the Euphrates turned into
the herb-garden, in the ancient story: they have no attend-
ant circumstances to justify them, no serrated pomp of cen-
tral Oberland towering up into the sky behind them; it is
a Ruysdael's waterfall in its gilt frame suspended against a
wall; or, if another simile is wanted, a lion in a cage of wires:
we pay our money, and we see our sight, and we leave the
spot; voilà tout !
On again, and I see another old town perched upon a hill,
at apparently a mile and a half's distance from the rail-
way station. I alight, for this is Spoleto, where I spent the
best part of two days in exploring its steep, picturesque
streets, in enjoying the panorama of the surrounding coun-
try from the walls, in paying more than one enraptured
visit to the golden-hued facade of San Pietro, to several
dives into the awful Romanesque crypt beneath the choir
of San Gregorio, and to studying the lofty choir of the
alas! desecrated San Niccolo, and the Early Pointed west
front of the sadly “Italianised” Cathedral, whose gem
is unquestionably the Cinquecento loggia, which extends
completely across the façade, being bounded at the north
end by a plain but gracefully proportioned campanile, like-
wise of the Renaissance era, and capped with a short oc-
tagonal spire of wood covered, if memory serves aright,
with copper. The twelfth-century part of the façade fea-
tures that of Assisi Cathedral, having in its upper portion
three shallow, pointed arches, of which the central one is
filled with a mosaic of Our Lord seated in Majesty, hold-
ing a book inscribed “Ego sum lux Mundi," between the
Blessed Virgin and St John. All the figures, which have
gold backgrounds, are very stiff and Byzantine. Our Lord's
upper robe is a slaty blue, His under one gold, and He
43
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
a
C
is seated in a curule chair. In the upper portion of the fa-
çade, which is comprised beneath one wide crocketed gable
and includes the aisles, are three circles filled with the most
delicate tracery, unglazed, and below the mosaic are five
more circles, the three central ones being glazed. The
with the evangelistic symbols in the corners; it is very well
traceried in the rayonnant manner, and rests upon a series of
six square-headed compartments, formed partly by figures
with uplifted hands and partly by colonnettes, with capi-
tals of the Corinthian kind. The Cinquecento porch in
front of the façade has five round arches on Tuscan pil-
asters, between attached columns of the composite order.
The frieze is most exquisitely moulded, and a balustrade
surmounts the whole. At either end of the loggia, between
composite columns, is a corbelled pulpit, approached from
the porch by stone steps. The square-headed Renaissance
doorway to the church is very finely moulded with leafage,
whose tendrils gracefully entwine,*and there are the remains
of a couchant lion which, no doubt, supported the shafts
of the original doorway. The colour of the façade is a deli-
cate brown. On the north side of the Cathedral is the nor-
thern ambulatory and part of the eastern one of a cloister.
There are eight arches, on octagonal columns, in the
Northern Walk and two in the Eastern, and there are two
stories of them, In the upper storey the capitals of the
columns have the Ionic volute. The vaults are quadripar-
tite,and as usual very meagre, and the columns are painted a
* The artist of this portal-Melioranzio—was, there can be no doubt,
inspired by the decoration of the doorway in the facade of the little
basilica of San Salvatore in the Campo Santo. That he was superior in
force to the carver who worked at that edifice is evident, but he cer-
tainly did not surpass hirn in delicacy of execution.
44
THE JOURNEY: SPOLETO
e sc
light brown, but the ensemble is picturesque. MDCXLIV
appeared to be the date of the completion of the cloistral
appendage to Spoleto Cathedral, whose interior is very com-
monplace Revived Italian, with, however, considerable re-
mains of the ancient mosaic pavement. In the conch of the
apse is a painting of the Coronation of the Virgin, and be-
low it the Annunciation, the Nativity of Our Lord, and
the Death of the Blessed Virgin, all, however, much faded.
In the apse are some poor stalls, with, in the centre, the
throne of the archbishop, surmounted by a tester of
purple velvet flowered with gold. On the lectern was a
Psalterium Romanum, printed at Venice in 1762, and a
modern missal bearing the imprint of Ratisbon.
Perhaps the most interesting object in Spoleto is the
Basilica of San Salvatore or Del Crocifisso, in the Campo
Santo. Built in the fourth century, this structure is the
earliest example known of a church with a lantern tower
rising over the chancel, and, moreover, with a solid roof. In
815 it had been dedicated to Our Blessed Lord, but Sansi,
in his Edifici e dei frammenti storici delle antiche età di Spoleto,
informs us that, in the middle of the twelfth century, it
was known as San Concordio.
In plan this little gem of antique art is a basilica with
nave and aisles. The latter were originally loftier than they
are now, the nave having been supported at first by col-
umns crowned by an architrave, after the manner still
: visible in the presbytery.
It was also equipped with low galleries, like Sta Maria
in Cosmedin at Rome, after its reconstruction under Had-
rian I. (772-795), as may be inferred from vestiges of
arches in the north wall of the nave. The apse, slightly
elevated above the presbytery, is flanked by two sacristies,
45
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
square on plan, and each provided with a miniature apse, a
later addition by the way. The basilica at Silchester, which
in all probability dates from between 315 and 415, affords
a very early example of an apse flanked by two “secre-
taria.” Besides this church at Spoleto there are two speci-
mens of the same arrangement-the Basilica Pammachiana
at Porto, near Rome (dating from the last decade of the
fourth century) and the large Basilica of Sta Symphorosa
on the Via Tiburtina, which is generally ascribed to the
fifth century.
Above the presbytery at Spoleto is a square tower but-
tressed at the corners, surmounted by a narrower and much
shorter one, which has a depressed four-sided roof made
square at the top to support a turret and cupola. Inside, the
transition from the square to the octagon is clumsily con-
trived by means of four triangular pendentives, resembling
sloping pieces of wall. That they were intended to carry a
spherical dome is clear, but the architect evidently changed
his mind, and substituted an octagonal lantern for it.
The front of the church is capped with a pediment and
two semi-pediments. In the upper part are four pilasters,
reaching nearly to the cornice. The capital of one of these
pilasters has been found, and is now preserved in the church.
Concerning the date and origin of this old church at
Spoleto there is much difference of opinion; some inclin-
ing to the belief that it belongs to the Constantine age, and
that it was a Christian church in the first instance; others
regard it as the result of the conversion of a pagan temple
into a church, in the time of Theodosius I. (378-395), and
his sons; others again that, originally a pagan building
adapted to Christian purposes, it received the form in which
we now see it in the twelfth century. Signor Rivoira, how-
46
THE JOURNEY: SPOLETO
ever, in his excellent Lombardic Architecture is of opinion
that “this extremely interesting building is the work of
one period, as is shown by the original masonry, not ex-
cluding the façade, which is intimately connected with the
nave, and forms an integral part of the basilica. It also
possessed a central tower with a solid roof, a fact revealed
by the masonry, and also by the pains taken by the archi-
tect to ensure its stability.”
The Signor opines that the period of erection of San
Salvatore at Spoleto must be rather early, not only from
the presence of the two sacristies flanking the apse, but
also by the architraves which carry the nave walls. He also
gives as additional reasons the rudimentary form of the
pendentives, by means of which the square of the tower
passes into the octagon, and the large, round-headed, un-
splayed windows. The period is, perhaps, that subsequent
to the age of Constantine, judging from the carvings exe-
cuted expressly for the façade. “They certainly do not ex-
hibit the power of the chisels of the time of Constantine,"
says Signor Rivoira, “but, on the other hand, there is not
as yet the poverty, hardness, want of clearness both in de-
sign and execution, which characterise Italian work of the
fifth century. Nor do they exhibit the typical features (and
this applies equally to the capitals in the three windows of
the façade), of sixth-century carving. It is enough to com-
pare the way in which the bead and reel mouldings and
the ovolos are treated in either case.”
On again, and at four o'clock in the afternoon of what
has been more like a day in June than November, I come
in sight of Assisi. Most exhilarating is the two-mile ride
from the station to the town on the box-seat of the omni-
bus pertaining to the Hotel Leone, whose English pro-
47
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
prietress I found so kind, and solicitous for the comfort
of her guests, that I have no hesitation in recommending
such of my readers as may visit Assisi to sojourn there.
As the Tiber leaves the shade thrown by the heights
crowned with the Etruscan Perugia for the sunny meadows
of a wide and fertile valley, its yet unsullied stream eddies
round a spur of the Apennines. This solitary hill is clothed
at its base with the olive and the vine, but when the winter
winds sweep it with their chill blast it is naked and bare
of verdure. As the setting sun throws its last rays upon
its rugged sides this November afternoon, it glows with a
golden light, and scatters infinite purple shadows from its
frowning rocks.
To an ancient town built on this barren declivity came
St Francis, after a life of perilous wandering, from the bright
world, to die. His profession of poverty, abstinence and
humility, whilst it exalted beggary into a holy virtue, had
nevertheless laid the foundation of a religious brotherhood
that in no way neglected worldly influence and power. He
hadscarcely died-covered by another’scloakover his wasted
body eaten with sores—than there arose over his ashes such
a monument as Italy, with her wonders of art, has rarely
seen. An architect from Germany, so it is said—was
invited to fashion the edifice after the new order of archi-
tecture. The steep and rocky slope afforded no sufficient
level space for the foundations; but in those days men had
invention in the arts, and trusted to their own genius,
instead of holding only to those who had gone before them.
Having probably no treatises on architecture to refer to for
an"authority,” he built boldly against the mountain, piling
one church upon another; the upper, vast, lofty, and admit-
ting through its broad windows the bright rays of the
48
THE JOURNEY: ASSISI
sun; the lower—as if in the bowels of the earth-low, solemn,
and almost shutting out the light of day.
Around the holy edifice grew the convent, a vast build-
ing, resting upon a long line of arches clinging to the hill-
sides. As the evening draws nigh, casting its deep shadows
across the valley, the traveller beneath gazes upwards with
feelings of wonder and delight at this graceful arcade sup-
porting the massy convent; the ancient towers and walls of
the silent town gathering around, and the purple rocks
rising high above-all still glowing in the lingering sun-
beams-a scene scarcely to be surpassed in any clime for
its sublime beauty.
The Church of St Francis at Assisi consists of three
churches placed over each other. The lowest is little more
than a vault, and its only interest lies in the tomb of the
saint. This church was not touched in the renovations of
1874.* Then follows the Middle (or, as it is usually styled
the Lower) Church, a massive shadowy and almost sepul-
chral structure of the thirteenth century; the vaulted roof
is of round arches; the side chapels, later additions, are
Pointed in the vaults, and in the windows, which are for the
most part filled with stained glass of superb character, its
general arrangement being the “single figure and canopy ”
one; the walls are covered with frescoes by the precursors
of Cimabue, by Cimabue himself, by Giotto and others.
The high altar stands, surmounted simply by the crucifix
and the six great candlesticks, at the crux of the nave,
transepts andapse. The Upper Church, also of the thirteenth
century, displays the Pointed Gothic style in all its sim-
plicity and breadth, and while the Lower Church is sombre
and sepulchral, the Upper Church rises with joy as a crea-
* For some account of these, see p. 247 et seq.
49
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
N CO
ture of the light into the sky. Both churches are alike
covered with frescoes, necessarily much “restored."* The
two churches, when they had received in the fourteenth
century the finishing touches of the chief masters of Flor-
ence and Siena, must have been the most lovely and mature
manifestations of pictorial art applied to mural decoration
then extant. But in the course of time not only did decay
come but, what was still worse, structures and paintings
belonging to later and corrupt periods were ruthlessly
thrust into the midst of early and good work.
The two churches, while they still serve for religious
functions, may be said to be now converted into museums of
art. And in no other spot, not even in the Campo Santo of
Pisa, can the early masters of the Italian Revival be better
studied. Frescoes by Giunta carry the spectator back to
the petrified forms of Byzantium ; chefs-d'æuvre by the
illustrious pupil of Giunta show how great an advance was
made under Cimabue, a master nowhere seen in equal
maturity or grandeur. A third generation brings us down
to Giotto ; fortunately, the compositions which here attest
the painter's creative power, symmetric arrangement, sys.
tematised treatment, and comparatively perfected style, re-
tain much of their original character. Thus we see the early
school of Florence transplanted to Assisi, andinlike manner
the contemporary, but rival, masters of Siena find in the
spiritual forms of Pietro Lorenzetti and of Simone Mar-
tini, a conspicuous and honourable place on these truly his-
toric walls. Signor Cavalcaselle deserves our gratitude for
having rescued these precious remains from further mutila-
tion and decay.
Although the ecclesiology of grandly-situated Perugia,
* See p. 244.
1
50

PERUGIA CATHEDRAL, FROM THE NORTH-EAST.
Arezzo CATHEDRAL, FROM THE SOUTH-WEST.
THE JOURNEY: PERUGIA
on the whole, disappointed me, the days passed in that city
were among the most delightful of my whole Italian tour.
All those who know their Central Italy need not be re-
minded how interesting a city it is, nor of how rich it is
in works of art. I had the advantage of delicious weather,
with a transparent atmosphere which made the distant near,
and pushed the horizon so far off as to include a boundless
range of mountain, hill and valley.
Many-towered, beautiful, Perugia lies: beneath it are the
windings of the Tiber, and the rich valley stretching away
to Assisi, and Foligno, and Spoleto. It is the Nuremberg
of Italy: full of public buildings, and houses quaint and
beautiful, passed down unhurt from the Middle Ages to our
own; full also, of exquisite examples of the highest art, the
works of her world-renowned school of painters: for here
it was that Pietro Perugino lived, and painted, and taught,
and hence that he sent forth his scholars, Pinturicchio, Lo
Spagna, and the immortal Raffaele; besides others of lesser
name, but lesser only by reason of juxtaposition with those
greater ones.
Florence is hardly more identified with Dante and Giotto,
or Assisi with St Francis, than is Perugia with the admir-
able artist to whom it has given the name by which he is
commonly known. I call him admirable, for so he is in his
best works, but there is a gulf between his best and his
worst works. Sometimes he is almost equal to Raffaele, and
sometimes he is far below himself. So far as one can judge,
from what we know of Perugino's life-though it is im-
possible to help distrusting some of Vasari's statements
he seems to have been one of those men whose genius de-
rives no elements of growth from the character. His early
years were darkened with poverty and struggle: his tem-
1
11
51
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
perament was not hopeful, nor were his manners engaging.
The remembrance of his sufferings and privations gave
him an undue estimate of the value of money, and when he
came out from darkness, or at least from dim twilight, into
bright and steady light, he esteemed it less for the sphere
of development which it opened, than for the means of ac-
cumulating property which it furnished. His studio was
degraded to a shop, and he himself to a mechanic; and his
insulted genius took revenge by rarer and briefer visits.
With the help of his pupils he painted an immense num-
ber of pictures, which were dispersed through the galleries
of Europe, and which have just merit enough to make one
vexed that they have not more. No artist ever painted more
pictures of which it may be said with truth they would have
been better if the artist had taken more pains. And, at best,
he is deficient in variety and dramatic power. When he
has many figures to deal with, he does not group them with
skill and judgment. Manly grasp and vigorous energy are
wanting, and there is a feminine weakness as well as femi-
nine delicacy in his pencil. His attitudes are stiff, and he
is deficient in that flowing outline, which is so great a charm
in the designs of his illustrious pupil. He is a decided man-
nerist, and his heads and faces seem to have been variations
of the same original model. But to these wants there are
great merits to be set down by way of compensation. His
colouring is soft, rich and mellow; remarkable for its har-
monious gradations and purity of tone. The aerial light of
his backgrounds has a certain spiritual look. His hands are
animated with an expression of tenderness, delicacy and
elevation, which however often repeated never fails to
charm. The sentiment of worship especially—the devo-
tional instinct which naturally bends the head forward, as
THE JOURNEY: PERUGIA
as
a tree is swayed by the wind is always conspicuous in his
pictures. It is difficult to believe the stories that are told
of his irreligion, when we look upon the rapt and glowing
heads of his saints and Madonnas.
Perugia Cathedral conveys the impression of its having
been the work of an Italian, who had paid a visit to some
of the vast "hall” churches of central Germany-St Eliza-
beth's at Marburg, let us say—but which he has not worked
out very successfully, the interior being quite devoid of
the solemnity and beauty of the Teutonic example, to say
nothing of its delightful proportions.
It consists of a nave with aisles vaulted at the same height,
short transepts, and a five-sided apse. The aisles are lighted,
as at Marburg, by a double tier of windows, of two
lights apiece with geometrical tracery, and the northern
transept also by two windows, of which the upper one has
two, and the lower one three, lights. In the latter the short
lights have rather stilted arches, and in the head are three
plate-traceried circles of much elegance. The nave, which
is too broad to be pleasing in a church of this class, is
divided from its aisles by tall octagonal columns painted
to represent marble, and with square abaci to their capitals,
whose carved ornament affects the acanthus type. The
aisle walls are disfigured by vulgar sham Gothic painting
and the quadripartitely vaulted roofs are profusely frescoed
in a Naturalistic style. In one of the windows on the south
side, from which the tracery has been removed, is some good
Cinquecento stained glass, bearing the date 1505, but the
rest have modern glass, in figure and pattern-work, of the
coarsest and crudest description, worse than what used to
be put into our own churches during the Early Victorian
period. A classical cornice runs along the aisle walls be-
53
THE CATHEDRALS QF CENTRAL ITALY
tween the two series of windows. The first bay of the
aisle on either side is screened off to form a chapel, the
tall grilles and gates presenting that graceful quatrefoiled
style of ornamentation in which the mediæval Italian artists
excelled, and of which we possess a beautiful specimen
formerly in Chichester Cathedral, but now to be seen in
the museum at South Kensington.
Externally the Duomo at Perugia is a shapeless brick
mass, intended to have been completely covered, like Flor-
ence Cathedral, with a veneer of marble. Of this decora-
tion only the walls below the windows and the correspond-
ing part of the west front has become an established fact,
but what has been done is extremely beautiful, the design
consisting of rows of ornaments in red Perugian marble and
white stone, which may be described as consisting of a
quatrefoil imposed upon a square. The same kind of
decoration may be seen in the chapels of the Lower Church
at Assisi. From this decorated wall on the north side of
the church projects a most charming little corbelled pulpit
of five sides, each side being relieved by two arcades set
within a pointed arch, and separated by angle shafts.
Just to the east of this pulpit a tall, square-headed Renais-
sance portal has been rudely inserted, the Pointed window
above it taken out to make way for a small balcony, and the
wall adjacent very roughly treated. But, despite these mutila-
tions, there is a great deal of very charming detail about the
exteriorof Perugia Cathedral, which would takeaplaceamong
curious rather than graceful buildings of the Italian Pointed
School. In front of the eastern part of the same side of the
nave, and extending across the facade of the transept, is a
loggia opening to the great square before the Duomo by
tour plain, semicircular arches on tall octagonal pillars.
54
THE JOURNEY: PERUGIA
One of the prettiest things in Perugia is the belfry of
the little Antica Cappella dal Barbieri (or San Matteo). It
is very tall, and rising without any division from the gable
of the front, looks as if it had been transported from
Rutlandshire. The first stage immediately over the centre
of the gabled front--which is lighted by a small circle
filled with lace-like tracery-is quite plain. This is divided
by a string-course from the next storey, which terminates
in a rather sharp gable and is pierced with two large and
two small trefoil-headed arcades, the two lower ones being
furnished with bells, and the two upper ones being placed
immediately under the point of the gable. The whole effect
little bell-cotes of which I encountered so many and varied
examples in Tuscany and Umbria.
In the choir of San Pietro is a series of magnificent
Cinquecento stalls, unequalled, I should imagine, in these
parts for allied beauty of design and delicacy of execu-
tion ; while at the east end of the vast Dominican Church,
is an enormous Geometrical Decorated windowof six lights,
filled with coeval stained glass of the greatest interest and
value. The Afternoon Offices were being monotoned in the
choir of the Cathedral about half-past two in the afternoon
of my arrival in Perugia. Previous to the service two small
tapers in silver candlesticks were placed upon a ledge be-
hind the high altar and removed at its conclusion.
On the following morning I attended the Chapter Mass
altar in the central bay of the apse, some tracery corre-
sponding to that of the windows in the four other sides
of the apse forming a species of case for the brightly bur-
nished tin pipes.
55
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Just as the Offertorium was about to commence, it was
discovered that some article required for the credence-table
was wanting, and one of the small acolytes, whose alb looked
as though it had long been a stranger to the washing-tub,
darted off into the sacristy in quest of it. On his return he
was reproved by the deacon; and here candour compels me
to state that the little acolyte forgot himself, and was vulgar
enough to indulge in a coarse habit peculiar to persons of
low and ill-regulated minds when they wish to express the
word“Gammon"pantomimically. This, unfortunately, was
perceived by one of the canons on the Decani side of the
choir, who, without any ceremony, left his stall and admin-
istered a box on the ear of the culprit, which resounded
with a distinctness quite remarkable in the sacred edifice,
whereupon the urchin thus caught in flagrante delictu began
to howl, and a scene, quite unprecedented in all my ecclesi-
astical experiences ensued ; together with an extempore dis-
cussion upon the subject of proper behaviour in church, as
connected with the fist--one party demonstrating it practi-
ally, and the other objecting to it theoretically.
The whole scene lasted scarcely a minute ; but to me it
was a minute of fearful agony; one of those situations of
extreme terror in which, authors tell us, “the sensations of
years become condensed in the conscious agony of the pass-
ing moment.”
The sanctuary being restored to order and quiet, the
service it is to be presumed went forward, as the Prayer
Book tells us, “in its accustomed order” ; but the scene,
which appeared to afford unbounded gratification to an old
woman, who was supposed to be paying her devotions to a
dressed-up doll that the present representative of Madame
Tussaud would have nothing to say to on any terms, was
56
THE JOURNEY: CORTONA
too much for the risible faculties. Almost choking with
suppressed laughter, I was constrained to quit the Cathedral,
and give full vent to my corked-up mirth before some
puppets that were opportunely going through their per-
formances in the Piazza outside.
Leaving Perugia in the forenoon of Saturday, 13th Nov-
ember, and skirting the great Thrasymene Lake, I found
myself, while the day was yet young, making the somewhat
toilsome ascent to the old Umbrian town of Cortona, and
under the guidance of a youth who had providentially re-
lieved me of myimpedimenta, found ascomfortablequarters
as could have been expected under the circumstances at the
Albergo Garibaldi.
The suite of rooms to which I had been ushered, com-
prising an enormous brick-floored sitting-room and a bed-
room equally commodious, was a very fair specimen of such
apartments in this part of the world. It was on the fifth
U
1
ing as you ascended the staircase ; or, to speak properly, as
they talk about the radiation of caloric at literary and scien-
tific institutions, “in an inverse proportion to the square
of the distance” from the street door. Besides this, it had
the advantage of a fine view, which included the steeples
and bell-cotes of several churches and the Lake of Thrasy-
mene—the same in its quiet beauty now, with its fringing
oaks and receding promontories, as when the Carthaginian
looked on it from those hills, which I could see bounding
the fertile plain that stretches away from the foot of the
eminence on which Cortona is perched, and marked it as
the spot for his stratagem.
There were books too, on the table of the palatial ante-
57
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
The British and Foreign Quarterly of 1838, containing, inter
alia, a review of Hallan's Literature of Europe, which, as I
had come almost unprovided with books—having resolved
on this tour to study what Dr Johnson styled the best book,
i.e., “Nature's Book”—served to beguile the long even-
ing. But as I ate my frugal supper I was lost in specula-
tions as to what wind could have blown The British and
Foreign Review for 1838 to such a place as Cortona!
And then I sallied forth to see what I could of the place
and the Signorellis in the Cathedral and Church of San
Niccolo.
None of the Cortona churches rise above mediocrity in
an architectural point of view, the Cathedral having been
rebuilt almost entirely in Cinquecento and the churches
being of the common Umbrian Middle Pointed type, with
aisleless naves and square-ended choirs, flanked by one or
more chapels. But although ecclesiologically jejune, I found
Cortona a pleasant place on the whole wherein to pass a
quiet Sunday, and to the lovely Signorellis and Lorenzo
di Niccolo Gerinis, and the views over the surrounding
country from the eminence on which Sta Margarita is built,
I recurred as often as I could. The services in the Duomo
were scantily attended. * At High Mass the music was sung
by a solitary tenor in the organ gallery, and at Vespers,
when the church was perfectly empty, a little acolyte varied
the monotony of the proceedings by leaning over the marble
balustrade between the nave and the sanctuary, and expec-
torating on the floor of the former, while during a solemn
Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, in a chapel at the
* There was a fairly numerous congregation at a Low Mass celebrated
at a side altar at 9 A.M., but as soon as the Aspersions had been performed
before the Chapter Mass, it decamped almost in a body.
58
THE JOURNEY: AREZZO
east end of the south aisle, the canons passed their snuff-
boxes to one another in the most friendly manner.
At the Chapter Mass the apparellings of the altar and the
vestments of the clergy were green, but at Vespers they
were white.
Seemingly the sacristan had omitted to change the colour
of the altar frontal for Vespers, which were “ The First”
of some day whose colour was white, and it was not until
the canons and choristers had seated themselves in their
respective places that the omission was discovered and the
proper altar frontal substituted.
The Afternoon Offices concluded, andanotherenraptured
visit having been paid to the Signorellis, a little motor omni-
bus, which by the way was not in evidence on my arrival
on the previous day, whisked me down to the station, to
catch the train for Arezzo.
Several sharp showers fell during the journey, but when
I stepped out at the Arezzo station the clouds had rolled
away, and were lying piled in snowy masses upon the hori-
zon. It was about half-past four o'clock, and preliminaries
having been arranged at the Albergo Stella, I lost no time
in making my way up to the Cathedral which stands on an
eminence at the extreme north end of the little city. Never
shall I forget my first view of its interior on this Novem-
ber Sunday evening, whilst the rays of a setting sun streamed
in gem-like hues-
“On marble shrines through rainbow-tinted glass_”.
and evening shadows were deepening on thehigh-hung vault
and dim-receding arches, producing an effect of true and
sublime religiousness, heightened by the strains of music
proceeding from a large chapel on the north side of the
A
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
nave, where Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament was just
concluding in the presence of a large and reverent assem-
blage of the faithful. The office finished, the officiating
priest, preceded by two acolytes carrying candles in lanterns,
and vested in a very rich white and gold cope, bore It to
the altar where It was to remain during the night, accom-
panied by a large proportion of the congregation, the great
organinthenorth aisle of the nave sending forth itsvoice in a
piece suitableto the solemnityand awfulness of theoccasion.
If the interior of San Donato at Arezzo appeared awful in
the twilight of this twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost,
doubly so did that of the Romanesque Sta Maria della
Pieve, which I was just able to glance round, while the old
custodian perambulated the aisles with a lantern previous
to locking up for the night. The church is not a very long
one, but the conditions of light under which I first saw it
put an appearance of infinity to the interior of Sta Maria
della Pieve. Externally, studied proportions, simplicity, yet
richness of detail, concentration of ornament, and quiet
emphasis of structural lines, enhance the scale and give a
rare effect of individual grandeur to the Duomo, which, in
clumsy hands, might so easily have been a mere gaunt mass;
while internally it is austere in form, but with a tempered
austerity. There is a fine and graceful serenity about the
five pointed arches which divide the body of the church
from its aisles, and the accentuation of the bays by the
shafts bearing the transverse arches of the vaulting. But
above all there is the mellow translucency of the almost
unrivalled Cinquecento painted glass in the windows of
the south aisle, the clerestory and the apse, which con-
tributes to a sum-total of decorative harmony, impressive
as it is impossible of description.
60

A wezo : Façade of Sta. Maus Delta Pored
Arezzo : FAÇADE OF Sra. MARIA DELLA PIEVE.
t
o
THE JOURNEY: FLORENCE
The railway ride from Arezzo to Florence in the long
third-class railway carriage which throughout the journey
was crowded with a heterogeneous, but most amusing com-
pany, passed without any particular adventure beyond the
ordinary casualties of travelling, and ere twilight began to
fall I caught my first view of that crowning glory of the
Cathedral, the bold conception of Brunelleschi, the whole
merit of which none but an architect can appreciate, though
none but a common apprehension is needed to feel its over-
cluster round its base, it appears to the eye the “ bright
consummate flower” of architecture, encircled by its un-
only at a distance from their own times, so this dome ot
St Mary of the Flower at Florence is most imposing when
seen from some one of the many heights in the neighbour-
hood of the city. There the grandeur of its bulk and the
symmetry of its proportion disengage themselves from the
objects around, and are felt in their full force. It seems a
presiding presence over the whole city, and all the inferior
edifices pay homage to it, and recognise its higher claims.
The Cathedral of Florence, a work which occupied a
hundred and sixty years in building, owed its origin to
the devotional spirit of the people of that city, while their
liberties were yet in their own keeping. The decree of the
Council, committing the charge to Arnolfo di Lapo, is
framed in a style of noble simplicity, worthy of the best days
of Rome :-
“Whereas the high wisdom of a people of noble origin demands
that in the conduct of their affairs they should proceed in such a
manner that their magnanimity as well as their prudence should
be shown in all external works, it is ordered that Arnolfo, the chief
61
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
artist of our commune, make a model or design for the restoration
of Santa Reparata, in such a fashion of exalted and sumptuous
inagnificence, that nothing greater or more beautiful can be con-
trived by the industry and power of man. And this is done in con-
formity with the resolution, publicly and privately expressed, of the
wisest inhabitants of this city, that no works of common interest
should be undertaken unless there be a fixed purpose to do them in
a manner corresponding to that great and general heart which flows
from the united minds of all the citizens who in this have but one
will."
On the dark, rainy morning of Wednesday, 17th Nov-
ember 1909, I attended the ordinary Chapter Offices in
Florence Cathedral.
When I went in a Low Mass was being said at the altar
in the apse of the northern transept, followed by Terce.
When it was nearly over, the canons and choir began to
assemble in the great octagonal space beneath the dome, en-
closed by low walls of marble, enriched with productions
of the chisels of Bandinelli and his pupil, Giovanni della
Opera. The canons in the upper stalls wore brown capes and
gowns over their arms; the minor canons in the middle row
had crimson capes, and the third row was occupied by aco-
lytes and singers. The Canons’ Mass was nobly sung, accom-
panied by the splendid organ within an archat the north-east
angle of the octagon, to the ancient Plain Chant. Two of
the acolytes, all of whom were chaussured in grey-ribbed
stockings and buckle shoes, stood by the central lectern,
which, under a strong lamp, bore a huge illuminated Gradu-
ale, before which, atthe proper times, the precentor, attended
by two cantors, stood at some distance facing east, and
some dozen singers grouped themselves between them and
the lectern. The priest, deacon, sub-deacon and ceremo
arius (vested in a cope) came in, in procession, whilea solemn
piece was played on the organ, which did not accompany
THE JOURNEY: FLORENCE
the Plain Chant, except now and again, being used princi-
pally, as almost everywhere in Italy, for the symphonies.
between the clauses of the Kyrie, Gloria in Excelsis, Credo,
etc. I remarked that there was a small movable lighted
candle placed on the high altar, which stands a little to the
east of the marble-enclosured chorus cantorum. Two torches.
only were brought in with the incense at the Gospel and
Consecration. When the Canon of the Mass began, the
two cantors left their seats and went to the lectern, where
they were joined by four others, whom they appeared to.
summon by a sign from their stalls, and then they sang a
Sacramental Hymn antiphonally. It was very beautiful to
see the reverence of the whole ceremonial : the singers
grouped round the lectern, and then went back to their stalls.
with the most perfect order and noiseless silence.
After Mass Sext was monotoned as Terce had been be-
fore it; though on Sundays and Festivals all the minor
Offices are sung with the full dignity of musical accom-
paniment. I regret that, owing to have to visit some churches.
in another quarter of Florence, I was unable that day to.
assist at the Afternoon Offices, but later in the same morna
ing, while making some ecclesiological researches on the
southern side of the Arno, I lighted upon a large Late
Renaissance church-San Frediano, served by one of the
orders whose precise appellation I do not recollect. There
had been an Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament here, and
the solemnities included a grand High Mass, which was.
hung with crimson stuffs fringed with gold ; every candle
on and about the high altar was alight, and the ensemble
was very imposing indeed. The Plain Chant, accompanied
by the organ, was very good, and at the conclusion of the
W
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
service, the religious, who had sung the Office in their stalls
ranged along the walls of the square-ended choir, issued
from behind the altar in gorgeous white and gold copes
and after ranging themselves in two semicircles just in-
side the balustrade separating the sanctuary from the nave,
retired in procession to the sacristy, whence they presently
emerged without their copes, and resuming their former
places in the stalls, started to sing Sext.
On another day of my visit to Florence, the choir, after
Compline, and before retiring to the sacristy, went in pro-
cession to the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, which is in
the eastern apse of the Duomo, and there standing in double
file down the centre sang a hymn; no Exposition followed.
Before the altar in this chapel seven lamps are ever burn-
ing, and at Vespers, which were sung with as much stateli-
ness and dignity of ritual and musical accompaniment as
the Mass already described, seven tapers were lighted on
the high altar, and at Compline three, an unusual number.
There are no two views seen from the same point so
beautiful as those which may be seen from the ridge of a
hill near Florence, justly named Bello Sguardo. Leaving
the city by the Porta Romana, a massive gateway with a
faded fresco in the tympanum of the arch, and ascending
the hill opposite, a group of villas on the summit are reached
after twenty minutes or so of walking. Immediately be-
neath, separated only by a foreground of terraces covered
with vines and olive trees, every edifice of importance in
Florence can be seen distinctly : the brown mass of the
Pitti Palace, the dark red dome of the Cathedral, with
Giotto's graceful campanile in front, the bold machicolations
of the tower of the Palazzo Vecchio, the spire-covered
campanili of Sta Croce and Sta Maria Novella, and the
64
THE JOURNEY: FLORENCE
Lt
lighter octagonal steeple of the Badia--altogether an as-
semblage of ecclesiastical and palatial architecture unpar-
alleled I imagine elsewhere, with the hills of the ancient
Fiesole for a background.
The visitor will be doubly fortunate if he sees—as I did
this view at sunset, for the hill on which he is standing
then throws a deep shadow, beyond which the rich red
light of the setting sun streams over the city, illuminating
all the angles of all the more prominent edifices, and bath-
ing old Fiesole in a rich purple glow. But turning round
and looking from the ridge in the opposite direction he
will see a view equally lovely but of quite a different char-
acter-an immense plain, thickly covered with vines, with
but few corn-fields intervening, and dotted with white villas
and villages, bounded on the right by the bare ridge of
the Apennines, and on the left by lower hills cultivated to
their summits. As far as eye can see the plain extends, rich
in cultivation and apparently densely populated;village suc-
ceeds to village, and here and there larger spots of white de-
note the larger towns, one of which is Prato, distant about
halfan hour by rail from Florence, and beyond, another, which
in the dim distance is grey rather than white. That is Pistoja.
Prato would be more frequently visited were it not
eclipsed by the greater glories of its mighty neighbour. It
is, however, well worthy the attention of the ecclesiologist,
as it contains what Florence does not, a fine Romanesque
cathedral. Although of very moderate dimensions it stands
on a platform ascended by three steps, in the Piazza or
Market-place of the town, where were wont to assemble
peasants from all parts of the country to see the Sacra
Cintola---or girdle of the Madonna—which is preserved in
the Duomo, and which was exhibited at certain periods
65
THE CATHEDRALS. OF CENTRAL ITALY
1
from the charming little external pulpit designed by Dona-
tello that forms so interesting a feature in the westernly
views of the church. This pulpit, which projects from the
south-west angle of the Cathedral, is an elegant piece of
Cinquecento work, circular in plan and surrounded by
dancing putti in low relief, perfectly modelled. Michel
Ozzi assisted Donatello in the execution of this work, which
was finished between 1434 and 1450.
The nave of this pleasing little Cathedral at Prato is
of the twelfth century; the transepts, choir and façade
are of the fourteenth, and attributed to Giovanni Pisano.
Within, Prato Cathedral is a perfect dream of construc-
tional polychromy. Stunted black marble columns, with
foliated capitals and stilted round arches, separate the nave,
which is of five bays, from its aisles; the fifth bay, which
was the beginning of the choir of the first church, has more
massive piers and a more widely-spanned arch, and is raised
two steps above the general level.
What may be called the east wall of the transept has
five arches opening into the choir and four chapels, square
in plan, an arrangement recalling that of Sta Croce in
Florence. The walls of the choir and chapels are decorated
with frescoes of various dates, and some description of
them will be found in the chapter devoted to the arts an-
cillary to architecture.
It is to be hoped that some day the miserable " pseudo-
Classical” ceiling will be removed from the nave and re-
placed by what was no doubt its original coveringa gabled
roof of wood with tie-beams.* Then the interior of Prato
* Merely a glance at the illustration of the interior of the Duomo at
Prato will show the reader that its nave was never intended to have a
vaulted roof.
66

LUCCA CATHEDRAL : VIEW ACROSS THE NAVE.
PRATO CATHEDRAL : INTERIOR, LOOKING EAST.
THE JOURNEY: PRATO
Cathedral, if not one of the grandest and most imposing
in this part of Italy, will be one of the truest, most lovable
and picturesque.
The short choir terminates square with one very large
long pointed window, without any tracery, but entirely
filled with elaborate but coarse and somewhat crude stained
glass, the effect of which, however, at a distance, with
the tall crucifix at the back of the high altar rising in front
of it, is remarkably pleasant. For a small cathedral interior
I know few possessed of so much dignity—a dignity that
is considerably enhanced by the well-graduated steps within
the last bay of the nave and that opening to the transept-
as this of Prato.
Externally, Prato Cathedral seen from the corner of the
round-arched windows, two Romanesque doors with fres-
coed tympana at the sides, a wheel-window above the princi-
at San Michele, Lucca, viz., at the extremity of the southern
transept.
It was late in the afternoon when I alighted at the
station of Pistoja—the old Roman Prætoria, near which
the conspirator Catiline was defeated and killed sixty-
two years before the birth of Our Saviour. During the
Middle Ages, Pistoja was the central point of the
deadly struggles between the Guelphs and the Ghibel-
lines. Here were formed the Neri and the Bianchi-the
Black and White-parties; the former were banished from
the town in 1301, as recorded by Dante in his Inferno :*__
« Pistoja first of Neri groweth meagre;
Then Florence doth renew her men and manners."
* Book xxiv. pp. 143 and 144.
67
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Niccolà Pisano, his brother Giovanni, and Andrea della
Robbia, have left traces of their genius in this little town,
which is not only celebrated for its architectural monu-
ments, terra-cotta decorations, frescoes by Leonardo da
Vinci, and sculpture, but also, as is currently believed, for
the invention of pistols, which are said to derive their name
from it.
The sadly-spoilt Cathedral at Pistoja, with its adjacent
campanile, is eclipsed, in architectural claims, by the beauti-
ful baptistery built opposite to it in 1337 by Andrea Pisano
and Cellino da Nese ; a graceful, though exceedingly plain
example of the Italian Gothic.
Among other remarkable churches in Pistoja I visited
San Bartolommeo (founded in 722), whose façade of the
twelfth century presents one of the earliest examples of
Tuscan Gothic. The thirteenth century is represented by
the façade of San Salvatore, whose architect was Bonus or
Buono, well-known in his day,and by San Francesco, which
was probably designed by the Franciscan Father-general,
Fra Elia, in 1265, and built in 1294, a huge barrack-look-
ing place, like most of its class in this part of the country.
The blinded architecture of the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries is before us at Pistoja in a striking example, San
Giovanni Evangelista, with three stories of blind arcades,
pilasters, and the usual Tuscan incrustation of black and
white marble courses in the only part visible from the broad
street in which it is located, viz., the north side. It is a most
interesting church, and fully deserves the praise bestowed
upon it by Ruskin, as “the most graceful and grand piece
of Romanesque work in North Italy.".
Sculpture also is represented in different phases at Pistoja.
That of the twelfth century, in the quaint reliefs over the
68
THE JOURNEY: PISTOJA
portals of San Andrea-narrowestof Romanesquechurches,
its nave being but 17 feet wide, exclusive of the aisles,
and at the same church of the Evangelist; that of the thir-
teenth, in the elaborate reliefs round a pulpit at San Bar-
tolommeo, by Guido da Como; and that of the fourteenth
century, in far higher development, in the more beautiful
reliefs, alike ranged round a pulpit, the work of Giovanni
Pisano (c. 1300) at San Andrea.
Generally speaking I found the Pistojan churches in
good condition ; no slovenly neglect here offends the eye,
and pseudo-restorations have not been offensively carried
out here as elsewhere. San Paolo, an admirable example of
the ancient local style, the façade erected and the body en-
larged in 1136, with singularly archaic statues of the Apos-
tle and two angels over its portal, is one of the churches
thoroughly repaired, without being spoilt, sincetheecclesio-
logical movement in Italy. Both this church and San Pietro
were founded in 748, and the latter has also a fine façade
with sculptures, ascribed to Pisan artists of the middle of
the thirteenth century. The interior-to which, however,
there was no means of access has been“ modernised,'' so I
was told ; the façade therefore was no doubt the part most
worthy of study. A characteristic of these earlier churches
is this union of sculpture with architecture, that seems to
have been the continually increasing taste at Pistoja.
The city is fortunate in the possession of three such rare
relics as the pulpits in San Bartolommeo, San Giovanni
Evangelista, and San Andrea. In the sculptured decoration
of these works we can distinctly trace the development of
early Italian sculpture, from the feeble efforts—even if so
replete with character-of an art whose sole life was de-
pendent on the force of tradition, to the work of the founder
69
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
WOW
of a school which was to render the Florence of the Renaiss-
ance so glorious in the annals of art.
Among the objects that have escaped the Vandals at
Pistoja, is the tomb in the Duomo of Cino Simbuldi, a
jurisconsult, a poet, and a friend of Dante, long a pro-
fessor in the University of Paris, and with whose name is
woven a touching love-tale, which he sang in couplets not
yet forgotten. His beautiful Selvaggia ranks with students
of Italian song with Dante's Beatrice, with Petrarch's Laura,
or Boccaccio's Fiammetta.
The tomb is one of that characteristic type of the thir-
teenth century of which in England Aymer de Valence's
tomb in Westminster Abbey is a far finer specimen. On a
bas-relief below the canopy is represented the master in his
chair lecturing to an audience.
Busy were the fast-shortening late November days that
I devoted to exploring the ecclesiological wonders of this
city. Of the Renaissance churches, that of the Umilata de-
lighted me beyond description, as being one of the most
extraordinarily planned of my acquaintance. It was begun
in 1509 from the designs of Vitoni, a pupil of Bramante,
but the cupola, which in many respects recalls that of the
Duomo at Florence, and is crowned with a most elegant oc-
tagonal lantern, was the work of Vasari. There is first a
nave running-if the church orientates, which, if I remem-
ber rightly, it does not do — from north to south, form-
ing a species of huge western transept, and opening by a
lofty arch into the vast domed space immediately adjoining.
The effect of this arrangement, though not of much use I
should conceive, is singularly impressive, but as I shall re-
cur to this remarkable church in a future volume, I shall
dwell no further upon it in this place.
nave
em
70
THE JOURNEY: LUCCA
At one of the Pistoja churches San Bartolommeo-
some obsequies had taken place ; the interior so remarkable
for its ambon, one of the earliest examples of its age and
class (thirteenth century), was redolent of incense, and
before the west door was hung a great black curtain, bear-
ing upon it a horrifying representation, in white, of a full-
length skeleton! and this inscription-Hodie mihi, cras
tibi !
An air of lovely and sheltered repose distinguishes the
scenery around Pistoja. Its battlements, walls, towers, and
cupolas rise boldly defined against the background of neigh-
bouring Apennines ; and when lit by the rays of a setting
sun, whilst purple evening tints rest on those mountains,
the scene struck me as one of the finest and most fascinat-
ing, among those that combine architecture and landscape,
of all I had witnessed in Tuscany and Umbria.
Lucca, the paradise of the archæologist, the city which
possesses in its churches finer monuments of the early Mid-
dle Ages-that is to say of the tenth and eleventh centuries
--than any other city in Italy, was reserved for the pièce de
résistance of this memorable tour.
The situation of Lucca, in the lap of an amphitheatre of
hills, is very pleasant; and the walks upon the ramparts,
which completely encircle the city, is one of the finest pro-
menades in Europe. The Sunday of my visit was calm
and windless, but the leaves of the plane-trees, which here
and there form short avenues, were falling fast and rustled
beneath my feet, as in the course of the day, between the
services, I circumambulated the city, admiring on the one
hand the works of God and on the other those of man. The
weather was beautiful, the outlines of the neighbouring hills
were rounded into the finest curves, and the level plain near
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
at hand, under the most careful cultivation, was now robed
in its autumnal dress of russet-brown.
To say nothing of the glorious Cathedral and the numer-
ous churches, some of which will be found detailed later on
in these pages, there are the statues and bas-reliefs of Civi-
talian artist whose works are hardly to be found anywhere
else.* They have a character and an expression of their own,
and mark a distinct period in the history of sculpture. And,
above all, that great artist, Fra Bartolommeo is in his glory
at Lucca ; and no one who has not been there can have any
adequate conception of the power and grandeur of his
genius. In the Church of San Romano, where on St Cecilia's
Day I heard the best performed musical Mass it has ever
been my fortune to attend in Italy, I looked in vain for the
celebrated Madonna della Misericordia. Much as I had
heard of this picture, and high as were my expectations, the
sight of it when I found it in the Palazzo Publico, fairly
took me off my feet. The figure of the Virgin, a girlish and
lovely one, full of warmth and feeling, rises from herthrone,
stretching forth her hands to Our Lord in glory, in the at-
titude of supplication, her mantle extended over crowds of
* Civitali was a native of Lucca, and flourished in the latter half of the
fifteenth century. He was a barber for the first forty years of his life, and
then suddenly became a sculptor, and attained to considerable eminence
in his new profession. Among his works must be named, the marble
pulpit ; the effigy of St Regulus above his altar in the south transept ;
the monument of Pietro da Noceto, Secretary of Pope Nicholas V.; and,
finest of all, the statue of St Sebastian behind the octagonal inarble Tem-
pietto of the Volto Santo ; all in the Lucca Duomo. This Volto Santo is
an ancient crucifix carved in cedar, and only exhibited on great occa-
sions. Before it hangs a lamp of pure gold, a votive offering of the Luc-
chesi, when their devotion was quickened by the approach of the cholera.
This little temple is under one of the arches on the north side of the
nave of the Cathedral. Of singular beauty are Civitali's two small angels
kneeling on either side of the tabernacle above the altar of the Chapel
of the Blessed Sacrament in the south transept.
72
THE JOURNEY: LUCCA
nce
people who pray to her. Above is the First Person of the
Trinity with several cherubs, and a tablet on which are the
words, “Miserior supra turbam.” Behind the Virgin,
cherubs are holding a sort of canopy over a large number of
persons. In front are many portrait figures. An old woman
in red is admirable-also a kneeling magistrate in a robe of
the same colour, and an ecclesiastic, his brother. It is not
easy to say in what respect this picture of Bartolommeo's
falls short of the best works of the best masters. Drawing,
colouring and expression are all fine; the composition,
noble ; the draperies beautifully managed ; and its tender-
ness and devotion most admirable. Kugler says of this great
painter that “generally speaking, we feel the want of that
inward power, so essential to the perfection, and even con-
ception, of grand and elevated subjects." With deference
to so eminent an authority, this seems to me to be a hasty
and erroneous judgment. Surely his works in Lucca, and
his admirable St Mark in Florence, must have escaped the
critic's memory, when he penned this depreciatory remark.
In Bartolommeo's works there is no want of inward
power, no want of elevation and grandeur; but, on the con-
trary, truth, religious feeling, correct drawing, and especi-
ally a splendid tone of colouring, which is only equalled
by the Venetian school. In another work by him, of un-
common merit, St Catherine and Mary Magdalene are.
kneeling, and the Almighty above. Mary Magdalene is in
red, and holding a vase-St Catherine in a kind of monastic
robe of yellow-both admirable figures.
In the cloisters are some curious old frescoes illustrat-
ing the life of St Dominic—the church by the way is still
served by fraternity of his order,-in one of which he is seen
hauling the devil along in a very unceremonious manner,
73
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
much like a constable dragging an unwilling culprit to
prison.
Reverting to the musical Mass which I attended at St
Romano's on this morning of St Cecilia's Day, I may add
that the Office was taken by a choral and instrumental
society in Lucca, who sat out of sight behind the high
altar, to a setting in a grave style by one Amatucci, and
that at the Offertorium the band played an Adagio of
Schumann's in excellent style. The celebrant, deacon and
sub-deacon, who wore crimson vestments over their albs,
and entered the sanctuary with their amices drawn over
their heads, but which they turned down on reaching the
altar, were quietly and reverently served by one acolyte in
an alb, over which was a short white silk cape.
The Cathedral of Lucca, originally a Romanesque build-
ing, has been so often restored and altered, that within it
presents all the features of a Gothic building. A most
charming effect is gained by continuing the triforium
across the transepts, and latitudinally over the centre of
the same. The capitals supporting the arches of the nave
and the vaulting are extremely bold and effective, though
to many minds the acanthus leaf in juxtaposition to Gothic
tracery will always be an offence. The difference between
the triforia arches in the nave and those crossing the tran-
septs is that the former are round, and the latter pointed,
and therefore the latter gives a far finer scope for the dis-
play of that delicate tracery in which the interior of this
Cathedral stands unrivalled in Italy. The manner in which
the nave triforium is returned across the west end is un-
deniably beautiful.
In a chapel within the Cathedral is one of Fra Barto-
lommeo's most delightful and cordial compositions, The
74
THE JOURNEY: LUCCA
Virgin and Child, with St Stephen and St John the Bap-
tist, and below a child-angel singing to a lute, with a heart
full of music and a face full of heaven. The Child in the
Madonna's lap is listening to the strain, and His little form
seems fluttering with delight, while a faint, soft smile of
sympathy plays round the Virgin's lips. What a soul that
cloistered monk must have had—“who never had a child”
-to paint a picture so full of human as well as divine
feeling.
After brief halts at Viareggio—where I hugely admired
the grand Roman-Ionic colonnades of white marble in the
Church of San Andrea-Genoa and Turin, I was set down
in the afternoon of St Clement's Day at the little station
of Susa, one of the most delightful of old Italian cathe-
dral cities, nestling in a valley of the Piedmontese Alps
shortly before entering the Mont Cenis tunnel.
was a calm sunlit haze everywhere, as if Nature was wel-
coming her winter rest. There were visits to the little
Cathedral of St Justus, which, though a good deal
modernised, contains several features of archæological
interest, notably its truly noble Lombard Romanesque
tower, finished with a charming Cinquecento cresting and
a metal spirelet ; and to the splendidly preserved Corin-
thian Arch or City Gate of Julius Cottius (B.C. 8), a
chieftain of the Alpine tribes, who submitted to the
Roman authority, and who has recorded his dignity
under the humbler title of Prefect. A somewhat remark-
able feature of this work is that the columns are set
on a pedestal which raises them considerably above the
pilasters of the arch.
Quitting Susa in the brilliant forenoon of a clear, bright,
75
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
frosty day, I journeyed rapidly through«France, halting
only between Modane and Paris at Tournus, with whose
solemn Burgundian Romanesque Church of St Philibert it
was pleasant to renew an acquaintance; Montereau, with
its charming parish church, a curious mélange of Pointed
Gothic and Early Renaissance, not very large, but charm-
ing in every way; and Melun, where the picturesque
flamboyant St Aspais, and the more deeply interesting
Romanesque and Early Pointed Notre Dame caused the few
hours at my disposal there to fly as if on silver wings.
the opportunity of making acquaintance with several of the
captivated my attention on previous journeys, Moret-les-
Sablons, between Montereau and Melun, and Persan-
Beaumont, Chambly and Borneuil, between Paris and
Beauvais.
All was life and bustle in the pleasant old capital of
Southern Picardy when I reached it shortly after noon on
Saturday, 27th November, and although the feet of the
strollers in the boulevards encircling it rustled through the
sere and yellow leaf, yet rich masses of brown and russet
foliage still hung upon the trees, and lit up into gold in
the sun.
The great transepts and choir of the Cathedral uplifted
the surrounding hills and woods were mellowed into sober
purplish-grey tints, but over them all the sun looked down
with that peculiar red glow which is only seen in November.
The next day, Advent Sunday, was just such another,
and with pleasant anticipations of the solemn services in
the Cathedral, I rose early, and shortly after eight o'clock
76
THE JOURNEY: BEAUVAIS
was pacing the spacious aisles and procession path of this
" tall man on tiptoe," the awful silence which brooded
over it being alone broken by my own footfall and the
occasional tinkle of a bell from the chapel, where Low Mass
was proceeding.
After a largely attended Low Mass at nine o'clock in
the Basse (Euvre-that simple, unpretentious Romanes-
que fragment of the old Cathedral which covers the site of
the contemplated but never achieved nave of the present
colossal edifice—the grand service of the day commenced
about a quarter to ten with the Chapter Office of Terce, at
the conclusion of which the versicles proper to the occasion
were sung with organ accompaniment and most thrilling
effect to the beautiful melody of the “ Jam lucis orto sidere.”
High Mass immediately began, the celebrant, deacon and
sub-deacon being vested in violet“ folded” chasubles, and
the choir rulers in copes of the same colour. The canonswore
long black cloaks over their surplices, and the "enfants
de cheur” looked charmingly picturesque—and “Coney-
esque”-in the little scarlet hoods which were drawn over
their heads in continuation of the tippet which they ordin-
arily wear. The music, to the ancient Plain Chant, was
most solemn and appropriate to the occasion, and together
with the ritual offered a marked contrast to the slovenly
performances I had witnessed in too many of the Italian
Cathedrals.
The neumes sung at the conclusion of certain portions
of the Divine Office were most grand, and accompanied as
they were with much taste on the organ in the choir-
which alone was used at High Mass-rose to the vaulted
roof in the sublimest manner, creating an impression which
will never be effaced from the tablets of memory.
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
At half-past two grand solemn Vespers were sung, when,
it being “The First” of some festival of the Blessed
Virgin, whose precise appellation I cannot recollect, the
copes worn by the clergy and choir rulers were white.
For the Office Hymn at Magnificat we had the “Ave
Maris Stella” to that lovely melody given in most of the
French “Paroissiens," and with its dulcet strains linger-
ing in the ears I took a final glance round the Cathedral,
looking awful in the dusk, and a stroll about the boule-
vards, now beginning to be dotted with lamps, until it
was more than fully time to catch the train for Amiens.
Hence, after the sojourn of a night, I entrained for Arras
a melancholy old place, but with a glorious Grand Place,
and a dignified, severely Classical “Empire” Cathedral-
and so on to St Omer, which I reached the same night, in
readiness for the boat from Calais the next morning.
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
CHAPTER II
The Arts Subsidiary to Architecture-1. Stained Glass
and Painting
RCHITECTURE is mainly deserving of being
T ranked amongst the fine arts when it calls into action
the varied and ingenious resources which the art of man
has discovered and perfected. It is barely sixty years since
that the architect required, even for some of his largest
works, churches, public buildings and palaces, little else
than good masons, bricklayers, carpenters and plasterers,
The bald and meagre imitations of ancient styles (excellent
in themselves) which occupied the attention of most of the
architects of the eighteenth century, to draw no nearer our
own time, afforded no scope for artistic talent, and the
works then executed, with a few exceptions, will never con-
fer on their designers the ennobling title of artist. Thus,
no artists themselves, they called in no art to their aid,
and Europe was cumbered with ugly masses of stone and
wood, in which the builder and not the artist triumphed,
and to which the name of architecture in its full meaning
is quite inapplicable.
and those buildings are the noblest, most satisfying, and
most interesting which have required and received the aid
of the artist in marble, stone, wood, mural and vitreous
colour, metal, mosaic work and so on.
In Italy, the climate, purity of atmosphere, and cheap-
ness of coloured materials had much to do with the pre-
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
valence of brilliant and beautiful colour, both inside and
outside of buildings. The Italians also employed materials
for external colouring which were equally accessible to us,
and which indeed have been introduced within the last sixty
years or so into English architecture ; such as terra-cotta,
ceramic ware, and glass mosaics. The most refined terra-
cotta ware is that found at Ferrara, with Cinquecento de-
tails ; but there are also many beautiful things at Bologna,
and the cloisters of the Certosa near Pavia are very inter-
esting and instructive examples of the use of this material.
It is said that terra-cotta being a cast material led to flat-
ness by the avoidance of undercutting, and to the lack of
interest by the repetition of features, but the Italians do
not seem to have fallen into either trap--their terra-cotta
work is full of vigour, sometimes, as in the Ospedale Mag-
giore at Milan too much so, and the more important fea-
tures were seldom or never repeated, but were undercut,
and modelled like features in stone or marble, the mould
being necessarily broken in the production of the first cast.
The repeated features are usually elaborately carved with
running ornaments, only a few fillets being left plain.
Thishas two advantages: it prevents the unavoidableflat-
ness of the mouldings being noticed, and hides the imper-
fections of the joints caused by the unequal shrinkage of
the material. Ceramic or majolica ware, such as we see at
Pistoja, was glazed or coloured, and belongs to the latter
half of the fourteenth century. The colours are mostly blue,
green, purple, or yellow. It is often used internally as well
as on the outside of buildings, but is found with few ex-
ceptions in decorative friezes and panels.
ed work, both in white and dark green (practically black)
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
marble, and in white marble or stone and red brick. Some-
times this treatment has an irritatingly unquiet effect, es-
pecially when photographed, buton thewhole is satisfactory,
and gives interest to many an otherwise flat-wall surface,
as for instance in the aisleless naves of the huge churches
built by the Preaching and Mendicant Orders, and on the
exterior of San Giovanni at Pistoja. The bands are invari-
ably horizontal, but there seems to have been no restric-
tions as to depth. Sometimes the dark and light bands are
about equal, sometimes the proportion is very unequal,
but white is always in excess.
Glass mosaic is employed everywhere, almost to the ex-
clusion of other forms of decoration, in the interiors of all
the important early Christian churches in Italy. The ground
of these mosaics is sometimes a dark rich blue, but more
usually golden. The tesseræ vary in size from that of a
finger-nail or larger to an almost microscopic minuteness,
and no particular care seems to have been taken about
their exact form. They are arranged in rows or lines, fol-
lowing the contour of the objects represented, the features
hard, and other important parts being drawn with the
smaller pieces, and the ground-work and flat surfaces with
the larger ones. The drawing, although stiff and conven-
tional, is more decorative in character than the highly fin-
ished productions of a later age. The colour is magnificent
in the extreme.
This branch of art had been entirely neglected in our
own country until the great question of the decoration of
St Paul's Cathedral, half a century ago, secured for it some
attention, for which we were principally indebted to the
industry and talent of Sir Digby Wyatt. But in the same
Cathedral, after years and years of patient waiting, tentative
81
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
experiments, and suffering from that “hope deferred which
maketh the heart sick,” we have seen the art raised, under
Sir William Richmond-however much we may object to
the style employed-to what we may consider the culmi-
nating point.*
In the adaptation of various coloured marbles to this
particular and perfectly normal species of decoration, no
people have so distinguished themselves as the Tuscans,
who have practised it with signal success, in more or less
good taste, for many centuries.
Of a peculiarly durable nature and capable of producing
the most varied and charming effects, it has been applied
by them to almost every purpose of external and internal
ornament, as for instance on the façades of Orvieto Cath-
edral and the Church of San Frediano at Lucca; f and the
interiors of the ancient basilicas in Rome, Ravenna, Tor-
cello, etc.
Although the Duomo and Campanile of Florence are
nearly covered with inlaid marble, sometimes in very beau-
tiful designs, it is perhaps not very well fitted for external
use, except on a very small scale, even in so fine a climate
as that of Italy; and although now degraded, by a false
idea of its capabilities, to the inlaying of tables with foolish
and unmeaning representations of such subjects as books,
music, pictures, and what not, it was at one time, especi-
ally from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century, applied
principally as an adjunct to architectural effect, and pre-
sents a large and interesting series of very beautiful designs,
* Salviati's mosaics in the eight great spandrels of the dome of St
Paul's, and Sir William Richmond's in the choir, choir aisles, and
“ quarter domes," afford interesting comparative studies of the new and
the old style of mosaic work, and critics take their sides according to
their predilections,
† Illustrated on p. 128.
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
principally executed in black marble on a white ground.
The earliest examples are still the finest, and the inlaid
pavements of the Cathedral at Viterbo, of San Miniato, and
of the Baptistery at Florence, executed at the commence-
ment of the thirteenth century, exhibit some fine specimens
of its excellence and durability. The most admired ex-
amples are taken from pavements and memorial slabs. As
regards the former, I need proffer no reasons for its use,
wherever the application of an ornamental stone floor is
required or its substitute for terra-cotta, but as regards its
application to memorial slabs, there is a difference of
opinion among experts.
There is no part of Europe entitled to greater respect
from all who honour Art, tested indifferently by the excel-
lence and variety of its monuments, the spirituality of its
artists' productions, or the honourable consideration in
which their works were held by all ranks of society, than
that of which this book principally treats. I mean Tuscany.
This high distinction was in a great degree due to a
fortuitous union of elements in the constitution of Florence
in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, such as may
never again occur. The favourable position of the city for
commercial pursuits, and probably some congenial sym-
pathy on the part of the citizens, early made it the seat of
a prosperous trade in, and manufacture of, woollen goods.
Its association with the Ghibelline cause nourished aristo-
cratic feelings of veneration for feudal nobility, while the
sanctity of the relics with which its earliest religious struc-
tures were endowed, fostered, more particularly among the
democracy, a fervent devotional respect for everything
ecclesiastical.
Through these three sources, an enlightened oligarchy,
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
a proud nobility, and an ever-active Church, ample patron-
age was provided for artists; and, as has for ever been the
case, genius sprang to life in profusion at the all-powerful
summons of wealth and honour.
Therewas, however, yet one more charm of great potency
at work to aid, and which indeed mainly generated, the
particular class of excellence to which I shall draw more
special attention in various parts of this work-I allude
to that particular veneration for technical excellence, and
honest work, which the municipality expressly desired
should characterise every work of art for which they gave
a commission. Men whose fortunes had been made by the
reputation of their skilful weavers, and of their sterling
tolerate in those magnificent structures, which were to be
the outward and visible emblem to foreigners of their state,
either bad, scamped work, or dishonest material.
Handicraftsmen of all kinds were honoured each in
their several degrees ; guilds and confraternities were erect-
ed with special privileges, and the services of all were en-
listed to heighten with every external magnificence the
pageants of the community, and the monuments of archi-
tecture and the arts ancillary to it, which were to be pro-
duced for the public enjoyment, and yet more for the public
honour. The triumph of the artist was to Florence the
triumph of one of its skilful children, whose talent was the
manifest source of ease and prosperity to all. Hence the
public rejoicings in the “Borgo-Allegro" over the strides
made in painting by Cimabue ; the public gratulations over
the exquisite manipulation of marble-work and mosaic by
Orcagna in the Or San Michele ; over the brilliant ability
of Donatello, Ghiberti, and Luca della Robbia, in sculpture;
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
and over the originality of Giotto and the daring of Bru-
nelleschi in architecture.
The public buildings in those palmy days of art were
looked upon as demanding the co-operation of all ; and as
each man who brought of his best to the work received at
the hands of his fellow-citizens, both in money and good
esteem, the full value of whatever he added to the common
stock of beauties, neither the greater men were permitted
to appropriate the honours of the less, nor were the less
permitted to filch the credit due to the loftier spirits.
II1C1 WC
all kinds, such as has been scarcely ever known in the
world's history, and hence is derived much of the peculiar
excellence and interest of the principal structures time has
spared to us upon the almost classic banks of the Arno.
In this volume space permits me to dwell upon three
only of the many technical arts which contribute to this
excellence : stained glass, painting and sculpture, though
allusion will frequently be made in these pages to other
of the ancillary arts, such as mosaic, marqueterie (in both
of which the Italians excelled), orfevrerie, and casting in
iron and brass, as exemplified in the superb screens and
gates, which are among the chief glories of Italian work
between the fourteenth and the seventeenth centuries. To
volume.
Amongst all the arts ancillary to architecture, there is
not perhaps one so capable of imparting splendour to a
building as that of stained or painted glass; a fact which
appears to have been known and practically applied from
the earlier period of the Christian era to the present time,
with a break of a century or so.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
The deep and brilliant tones, the fine drawing, the sim-
plicity and the solidity of the examples of the fifteenth
century in Tuscany, resembling in character the best pro-
ductions of the early Venetian painters, gave place to works
of a more ambitious and flimsy nature ; and we perceive in
the first quarter of the sixteenth century a complete diver-
gence of style in the great windows of Arezzo Cathedral,
executed by the so-called William de Marsiglia or Marcilla,
in 1523. The qualities alluded to in the fifteenth-century
subjects are lost, and the encomiums of Vasari, who de-
scribes them as something rained down from Heaven as a
consolation to mankind, is certainly due to the Florentine,
Lucchese and Sienese examples, than to these somewhat
flimsy and straggling compositions ; but Vasari was an
Aretine. About this period also works en grisaille became
very frequent. These are painted with enamel mono-
chrome, on a white field, and though not very effective,
are pleasing, from the fancy and skill exhibited in their
execution.
Such are the windows of the Laurentian Library at
Florence, designed, if not executed, by Raffaele's favourite
pupil, Giovanni da Udine, about 1540. Contemporary with
this fashion, a richly-coloured system of glass-painting, by
Swiss and German artists, was much in vogue ; generally
on a much smaller scale than that hitherto practised, being
chiefly used in civic and private residences. At the end of
the fifteenth and during the sixteenth century, and even
later, Nuremberg, Ulm, and Freiburg-im-Breisgau, were
especially famous for works in this style; but this last
flitting gleam of departing splendour had, by the eigh-
teenth century, nearly died out, and from that period, as
with us, glass painting, in common with all the decorative
ITIO
86
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
arts, as applied to architecture, lapsed into a feeble Classi-
cism, and then fell into desuetude and decay.
Of all the Italian stained glass none surpasses the early
fifteenth-century work in the Duomo at Florence, in point
of profusion, brilliancy, and excellence of design and exe-
cution. It certainly excels all other that I have seen, and
appears to have been made from slices of large gems cut
out and formed into histories and figures, just as they make
Florentine mosaic of the present day. At the Opera I was
shown some pieces of this glass ; it was blue, of a greenish-
grey tone, and very like what Sir Edward Burne-Jones
employed as the background to the windows he designed
for William Burges at the east end of Waltham Abbey,
fifty years ago. I observed that the effect of this dull green-
grey blue is to bring up the other colours, and render them
more brilliant ; whereas when a bright blue is employed
for the background a contrary effect is produced.
All this glass in Florence Cathedral deserves to be
studied most attentively, as I fully believe no better is to
be found in Italy. It is, however, probable that it may owe
something to the intense light of a southern climate, which
would allow the artist to employ more toning than he would
venture to do in this country; but then there would remain
a great deal to be accounted for as regards the harmony
of the colours, etc.
In the fine stained glass which fills the windows in the
apsidal choir and square-ended chapels of Sta Croce, as
well as several in the nave of that vast Franciscan church,
I observed that the canopies and tracery are not formed
of yellow glass drawn with black lines, as is usual with
us; but the members of the tracery are formed by the im-
mediate juxtaposition of different colours. For example, a
1
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
trefoiled light would have the light itself of dark ruby,
the trifoliating arch a narrow band of yellow, the spandrel
spaces between the cusps and the outer arch, green ; this
arch itself white, and the glass external to the arch, blue,
A circle in the heads of traceried windows in Italian Gothic
churches is very often occupied by a Crucifixion, as in
Sta Croce, or by an Annunciation, as in San Petronio,
Bologna.
The window seen over the high altar in Sta Maria
Novella at Florence is a triplet of broad lancets within an
arch, the spandrels relieved with three circlets of tracery,
and it contains what engaged the greater part of my time
in Sta Maria Novella, stained glass of so superb a char-
acter that it deserves to be ranked amongst the most re-
markable and effective examples to be found in the Cinque-
cento style. It is believed to have been executed in 1490,
by Allessandro Florentino.
Each side light of this triplet contains three figures of
saints in niches, placed one over the other, surmounted at
the top by a dome, presenting a mass of powerful and brilliant
colour, an excellence of design and execution, and a breadth
of light and shade, such as can seldom be met with ; and
when the setting sun throws its rays full on these windows
nothing more wonderfully gorgeous can be conceived. It
is then we arrive at the conviction that it is only by
painting on glass that the colourist can hope to obtain effects
to vie with the most beautiful tints of Nature, as seen on
birds, insects, shells, jewels, in comparison with which the
greatest efforts of the Venetian and Dutch schools of
Delacroix or of Etty appear dull and lifeless. This may
be accounted for by supposing that, in the case of an oil-
painting, the image is impressed on the retina of the eye
88
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
Sare C
by reflected light, whilst in that of a window the object is
cast on it by direct rays.
In these windows the designs are composed like those
in the Duomo, of irregular pieces of glass, without any
regard as to where the lead-lines may occur, except in the
faces, and even then, occasionally the artist was not very
particular. The pieces of glass in Sta Maria Novella are,
however, generally of larger size than those in the Duomo.
There are very few portions left perfectly white, and the
lightest coloured are always of a warm cream or light straw
tint, the shadowed portions hatched in with rich brown
bistre lines. The skin is generally of a rich, somewhat red,
sienna tint, with warm brown shadows; and all the latter
are strongly marked, especially in the draperies ; indeed
the whole system employed reminds one of the great school
of early Venetian colourists, represented by Cima da Cone-
gliano, Marco Basaiti, and Carpaccio. The features, ex-
tremities, and anatomy (when seen) are excellently drawn;
the faces of the men are characterised by a manly nobility
of expression, and those of the women by much sweetness
andgrace-in striking contrast to thosein too much modern
work, where they are, as often as not, the personification
of silliness. The artist has felt himself at liberty to apply
colour arbitrarily to the architectural accessories : there
is little attempt to be matter-of-fact in these aerial build-
ings, which glitter with all the splendour of works com-
posed of the most precious stones and jewels ; and when
masses of colour occur, they are generally rendered lumin-
ous by small bright dots on a darker ground of the same
tint. In the draperies two particular kinds are observable ;
the one black, which, brightened up by some pattern, such
as white stars, becomes of essential service as a key and a
89
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
contrast to the brighter colours ; the other a dark purple,
of incomparable beauty. As I have already noticed in the
Duomo windows, the lead-lines suffice to give distinctness
and force to the whole design. The borders of the Novella
windows are boldly designed and very effective, and plainly
show how much labour was frequently wasted in the minute
ornament too often seen in the stained glass of thirty years
ago.
The greatest impulse given to the art of glass-painting
in Italy was due to men of northern birth or education.
Even at Venice a German monk of the minor order of
Franciscans, who was known as the “Frater Teutonicus,"
seems to have been the leading genius of his art there at
the early part of the fourteenth century. His works were so
much esteemed as to become models of the art, and copies
are especially described as being carried out in due respect
to him, painted in his manner, “ pictæ ad modum Teutoni-
cum.” In Baldinucci's life of Lorenzo Ghiberti is given the
history of these glorious windows in the Florence Duomo.
Ghiberti was not only the greatest sculptor of his time but
a glass painter. “Being curious," as Baldinucci describes
him, “in everything appertaining to the arts, he turned
his attention to the noble work of that kind of painting
which is called the mosaic of coloured glass.” This is a re-
markable expression, "quella sorta di pittur a che dicesi
musaico di vetri colorati," as correct in its definition of
the art as of its technicality. Ghiberti, dissatisfied with
Italian glass and glass-painters, having heard of a Florentine
who had learnt the art in Lübeck, and was then living there,
represented the case to the council of the Operai. In Lastri's
work, called the Osservatore Fiorentino, of the eighteenth
century (a mine of curious information on art and archæo-
n
.
90
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARÝ TO ARCHITECTURE
logical subjects), there is given the text of a document
drawn up by that council of artificers, in 1436, resolving
that this famous glass-painter should be invited to Florence
to paint the window in the cupola of Sta Maria del Fiore ;
that he should be brought with all his family, without cost,
from Lübeck, and be protected from all harm and loss, that
he might work in security, and that his art might reflect
honour upon his native Florence. Ghiberti designed all
the windows but one, and this Livi da Gambasso painted
them in his German manner. The remaining window, re-
presenting the Coronation of the Virgin, was designed for
him by Donatello.
There is an interesting description in Lastri's work of
a convent at Florence, near the Porta a Pinti, destroyed at
the time of the siege, formerly inhabited by a religious
company of glass-painters. He calls them “Frati dipin-
tori di vetri da fenestre." Among others who lived and
worked with them and designed for them was Pietro
Perugino.* Fra Granacci used also to make their cartoons.
The monks were good chemists ; and even their Prior
used to occupy himself in grinding ultramarine for
Perugino's frescoes. The cartoons which Perugino made
for these glass-painters are recorded as being those for
calls these cartoons “Pitture ad ornare i vetri delle fin-
estre." But these good glass-painting brothers had learnt
* Donatello, Ghiberti, Perino del Vaga and Perugino designed for
it are but few indeed. Their style may be in a degree inferred from
contemporary works, and they are grandly bold and vigorous, and in
their best specimens rich in that refinement too, from which a true
artistic sense could never err, even in its most dashing and reckless
humour.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
their art principally from the schools north of the Alps,
whence they came to Florence at the end of the four-
teenth century.
The other founder of a northern school in Italy was a
Frenchman. Vasari has written his life under the name of
Guglielmo da Marcilla ;* Marseilles was, however, not his
birthplace. His family was of Verdun, in the north-east
of the country. To this Frenchman, more properly called
Guillaume de Verdun, is due the last development of a
good school of this art in Italy. He worked at his art
throughout, made the cartoons, translated his subjects
into glass, and even attended to the setting of the
leads.
At about the same time other French glass-painters
were invited to Italy, and worked with Pietro del Vaga,
who designed some of their works at the Vatican. Vasari
writes also in praise of some Flemish artists who came to
Italy in his time ; and so much was he captivated with
their work that he himself learnt it at the hands of a
pupil of the famous German Beato Giacomo. But with
the sixteenth century the wholesome traditions of the
northern school waned away, and the history of glass-
painting in Italy was closed.
Why, the reader may ask, was it that such men as
Lorenzo Ghiberti, Perugino, Perino del Vaga, Giovanni da
Udine, and others, needed to call to their country of the
arts in their very halcyon days the northern Jacques
Allemand from Ulm, Livi from Lübeck, and Guillaume
from Verdun? Were not those giants of art capable of
managing painted windows ? No, by their own confession,
* Specimens of Marcilla's work may be seen in the windows on the
south side of the nave of Arezzo Cathedral.
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
that art was a special one, not their own. It was not the
mere glass that they wanted from the north; they had
that glass already. The well-known French and German
smalti were at their hand in universal use in Italy. What
they needed, and what they sent for, were men who could
translate their works into glass. There was the secret ; there
was the difficulty. The pencil of Ghiberti had known
what to put on the cartoon, but it was the German-
taught glass-painter who knew what of it, and how, to
put into glass; and both were pleased with each other's
work, though both were different. Let there be nothing said,
therefore, about placing a limit on high art. If Raffaele had
pencilled the mere outlined groups on a Pompeian or an
Etruscan vase, they might have been divinely beautiful.
Let us have no limit to the highest attainment of design;
but let each office of the art be recognised in its place,
and there perform its duties. Let us have the picture, the
fresco, and the window, each as beautiful as art can make
them, in each case wrought on different principles, as
beautiful as Perugino used to design them, or as the Beato
Giacomo could translate them into glass.
In our own country we owe much to Mr Winston's
devotion to the art of glass-painting, a debt of great
gratitude, waiving all questions of idiosyncrasy. The thin
poverty of so much of the modern glass produced during
the first thirty years or so of the English Gothic Revival
was due to its chemical purity—the rich effect of ancient
glass resulting from the large admixture of what modern
manufacturers would call impurities. The former was like
the unsuggestive flatness of hot-pressed letter-paper ; the
latter resembled the texture of well-grained canvas to
paint upon. Our love of perfect technicality has often been
93
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the ruin of our arts in England. This letter-paper style of
glass was the only material available for painting when
Winston threw his energy into the subject. Against this
he at once waged war. Glass-makers may have known how
to make it otherwise, but they did not, and they would
not. It was very much due to Winston's pertinacity that
they were induced to do otherwise. To verify dates of
glass-paintings when the renaissance of mediæval art in
England was in its infancy was not an easy process.
Winston, however, was a master of it. For instance, the
great east window of Gloucester Cathedral, which is not
only the largest but one in England, but one of the finest
specimens of old glass in existence-there was no reliable
record of its history. But Winston so elucidated it as to
leave no shadow of doubt as to who were the principal
the precise year in which it was erected. Moreover, he
personally supervised its restoration when, about 1862,
through the care and liberality of Dr Jeune,* it was placed
in the hands of Messrs Ward and Hughes for that
purpose.
Winston accumulated a great store of precedents, and
wrote with excellent judgment upon them. Since his death
in 1864, others have taken up this great art, and a more
individuality as an independent branch of art more clearly
appreciated, and its genius given its proper scope. There
is no fear for the art of glass-painting in England now,
except one, and that is the danger of its running into
absurdity, as unhappily is evidenced by some windows in
* At that time Canon-Residentiary of Gloucester, afterwards (1864-
68) Bishop of Peterborough.
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
St Etheldreda's, Fulham, and St Peter's, Clapham, which
are, to use the mildest term-childish.
As an art, stained glass in England at the present day
-taking it all round-is standing firm on the sure ground
of its own merits; and artists, relieved from the trammels
of other arts and systems, can revel in the glory of their
glass. I may venture to say that, within the last six years or
so, I have seenas much of modern stained-glass painting, both
at home and abroad, as has fallen to the lot of most people ;
and I can confidently affirm, to mention only such triumphs
of the art as Messrs Clayton and Bell's glass in the great
west window of King's College Chapel, Cambridge, St.
James', Bury St Edmunds', Truro Cathedral and St
Augustine's, Kilburn, Mr Kemp's in St Agnes, Kennington
Park, Messrs Lavers and Westlake's in the east window
of St Paul's, Knightsbridge, and Mr Victor Milner's in the
exquisite church built from Mr Temple Moore's designs at
Sledmere,* that in this particular art, ancillary to archi-
tecture, England at the present day is without a rival.
Central Italy is far richer in stained glass than Northern,
and it appears extraordinary that more attention has not.
been given to it. Amongst the finest works may be more
particularly mentioned, at Florence, the very rich early
Florentine Gothic windows of Or San Michele, and Sta
Maria Novella, also those in the aisles and row of eastern
chapels at Sta Croce ; several windows in the Duomo, said
to have been carried out from the designs of Ghiberti and
Donatello, the great circular window (the Descent from
the Cross) by Ghiberti, in Sta Croce, and the circular
window of San Spirito. At Lucca, in the apse of the
* One of a group of churches in the neighbourhood of Driffield,
restored or rebuilt by the munificence of Sir Tatton Sykes.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Cathedral, and in the Church of San Giovanni is some
magnificent old glass; at Siena, the large rose-windows at
the west and east ends of the Cathedral are very lovely, the
former, representing The Last Supper, designed by Pierino
del Vaga, and executed by Pastorino. In the Church of
Fonta Giusta at Siena are some fine pieces; in the two-light
Middle Pointed window inserted in the Romanesque apse
of San Paolo a Ripa at Pisa are exquisitely tinctured half
figures of saints; in the Duomo there is some, rich in
colour, but confused in design; and at Prato, in the
Cathedral, somewhat coarse and crude. The large windows
in the south aisle of Arezzo Cathedral are of sixteenth-
century date, thosein the apse much earlier; a circular window
in San Francesco, and some excellent examples in Sta Annun-
ziata, also at Arezzo, will repay study; then there is the
enormous Gothic window in the square-ended choir of
the Dominican church at Perugia ; and lastly, the entire
series of windows in the Lower and Upper Church of San
Francesco at Assisi, principally of the fourteenth century,
and of a remarkably ornamental character. *
To the mediæval Italians painting always was the art
par excellence, and they cultivated it with the same earnest-
ness and ability which distinguished the Cisalpine nations
in elaborating their beautiful style of architecture. In our
buildings painting was always kept in strict subordina-
tion to structural necessities; with the Italians the structure
* Modern Italian glass-painters of a generation or so ago seemed to
have no idea whatever of imitating the glorious colours and drawing of
the mediæval work, for there is some in the northern transept of the
Lower Church at Assisi which for badness outstrips all the efforts of
some of our very earliest revivalists. It belongs to what may be called
" the painted blind” school of glass-painting, such as we see in those
sorry windows on the north and south sides of Peterhouse College Chapel,
Cambridge.
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THE EAST WINDOW OF SIENA CATHEDRAL.
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was generally considered as less important, and never
thought to be complete or perfect till the painter had
covered every available space with the productions of his
Italian art is to that of other European schools what
Athens was to Greece. The very instinct of art seemed to
have taken a deep root in a land favoured by Nature, and
which history had rendered Classic. But there was still
another cause which gave to art in Italy so vigorous a
quality. She was by nature sensitive and æsthetic to a
high degree. Her mountain fastnesses had checked the
deluge of the barbarians after the fall of the Roman
Empire; thus the traces of ancient civilisation had been
preserved to her, while the freedom of her municipal
system and the independence of her republican institutions,
favourable to its progress. Rich and powerful common-
wealths, governed by eminent citizens, sprung into exist-
ence, and became the fostering centres of art. Thus
Venice and Genoa acquired great power and influence,
their ships covered every sea, and “Italian factories rose
on every shore.”
Again, the influence of the Church was a powerful
incentive to art; for, as Lord Macaulay has so finely ob-
served, “the Roman Church has enriched sculpture and
painting with the loveliest and most majestic forms.
Of all religions it is the most poetic; it has united
the awful doctrines of the Christian faith with the 'fair
humanities' of ancient superstition. Its legends, martyrs,
and saints vie in interest with the mythological fables of
Greece, and have become the finest themes of religious
art."
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
To those whom humility and purity of heart have gifted
with clearness of mental vision, there is something inex-
pressibly touching and strongly calculated to excite true
devotion in the sight of even the rudest attempts of the
Primitive Church to perpetuate the fervent recollection of .
the merits of Christ and His saints, and to set forth in
characters legible even to the most unlearned, the jewels
of our Holy Mother,
The simplest picture of the Blessed Mary, ever Virgin,
bearing in her immaculate arms the Infant Jesus; the
rudest delineation of one of the miracles whereby it has
pleased God to glorify the saints of His Church, cannot
fail to excite in minds duly disposed to acts of faith and
love the most truly devotional disposition. To the poor
and illiterate such aids are invaluable. Illiterati quod per
Scripturam non possunt intueri hoc, per quædam picturæ line-
amenta contemplantur.
The consecrated statue or picture which the iconoclast
impiously destroys have been to many the books of life
in which to learn obedience and love. Nor is the existence
of such palpable and striking emblems of inferior utility
to the wise and learned. In holes and caves of the rocks
the Church may take refuge in times of persecution, and
there offer her sacrifice of praise and prayer. But in brighter
days it is the bounden duty of all to dedicate to the service
of God the best riches of every art. And this is a duty, not
because the Almighty or the goodwill of saints and angels
can be purchased with offerings of wood or stone-which
it would be blasphemy to suppose-but because such has
ever been the wise rule and practice of the Church since
she vanquished her pagan persecutors.
There is one danger connected with this offering of the
се
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results of human talent and labour to the worship of the
Almighty, namely, that if their execution be confided to
worldly-minded and material individuals, objects may be
introduced of a directly or indirectly debasing tendency.
And therefore it is well remarked by Vasari, that devono
coloro che in coso ecclesiastiche e sante s'adoperano essere eccles-
iastici e santi nomini.
The great change brought upon the Christian world by
the Emperor Constantine had its natural effect upon ecclesi-
astical painting. From the catacombs the holy artists arose
to decorate the basilicas, and, leaving the allegorical forms,
which persecution had rendered necessary, traced every-
where the images of triumph and beatitude, and delighted
to place above the sanctuary the figure of Christ between
the Apostles St Peter and St Paul. In these paintings, as
well as in those of the Blessed Virgin, executed for the
most part in mosaic, neither beauty of execution nor ac-
cessory details distracted the attention, but the funda-
mental and holy idea shone forth in all its grandeur and
simplicity.
The Christians at Rome were preserved by their horror
of idolatry from the temptation of introducing into their
works any types taken from the masterpieces of pagan
antiquity. Byzantium first fell into this erroneous practice,
and degraded its churches not only with sea-views, land-
scapes, and representations of animals, but even with copies
of the heads of heathen gods, under the vain supposition
that additional majesty and attraction would be thus given
to the features ascribed by tradition to the Christ, the
Virgin, and the saints.
The conquest of Byzantium under Justinian had a per-
nicious effect on Italian art, interrupting for a time the
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
an-
ans
primitive ideas, and allowing these but slowly and pain-
fully to recover their due influence.
Two centuries later, the war of the iconoclast Emperors,
which Gibbon has related with unequalled partiality and
bad faith, gave a terrible shock to Christian art, and had
well-nigh crushed it in its infancy. Naples fell into the
snare and espoused the imperial cause ; but other cities of
Italy, as Rome and Venice, eventually drew additional
brightness from the trial.
Under Charlemagne began in the arts, as in language,
that slow work of change and transformation of the old
into the modern, which later philosophers have called “the
long slumber of the human mind." The primitive Roman-
Christian school soon became extinct, and there rose up in
its stead the German-Christian artists. Some historians
have supposed the introduction of art into the northern
part of Charlemagne's empire to have been owing to the
marriage of a Byzantine princess to an emperor of Germany.
But I think it far more probable that the originality of the
schools of art which appeared in France, in Belgium, at
Cologne, and elsewhere, is a matter of historical and in-
contestable proof. The prolonged existence of Byzantine
art may be ascribed to its having been patronised as the
only one in Italy during the process of transition which
the primitive school had necessarily to undergo in order
to fit itself for the lofty mission it was destined to fulfil
under a new state of things.
The deep decline of art for some time previously to
that mysterious year, 1000, seems less glaringly manifest
in painting than in sculpture ; and in the prevalent severe
and mournful character peculiar to works of the earlier
mediæval periods, we perceive a result or index of moral
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tendencies, of the high regard in the public mind for ex-
amples of extreme asceticism and self-mortification, of the
trust in the expiatorial virtues of self-inflicted suffering,
and the gradually developing system of canonical penance
regulated by a tariff of penalties to be paid as the debt for
sin.
The art school introduced into Italy after the Iconoclasts
had exiled so many monks, who spent their time in paint-
ing sacred pictures, continued long dominant, and marked
by all the characteristics of its Byzantine origin. To that
school, whether to Greek or Italian pencils, must be as-
cribed most of the usually veiled Madonnas enshrined
above altars in the Roman Churches, and in not a few in-
stances ascribed with utter disregard for all known history
to St Luke; also those images superstitiously assumed to
be authentic portraits of Our Lord, as the “ Volto Santo,"
and the full-length, encased in silver, at the “Sancta Sanc-
torum” or Chapel of St Laurence, the ancient oratory of
the Lateran Palace, now entered at the summit of the Scala
Santa. This picture, first mentioned in the report of the
procession when it was carried by Pope Stephen II. in 753,
at a crisis of danger to Rome from Lombard invasion, led
by the King Astolphus, is usually concealed from view,fas
that chapel itself is usually inaccessible, but on certain anni-
versaries it is unveiled with silent but impressive cere-
monial in presence of the whole Lateran Chapter, who
pass processionally from that basilica to the adjacent
building for this devotion to the thrice-sacred picture.
The“ Volto Santo" is first mentioned in the account of
the consecration of the Pantheon by Boniface IV., about
608, when that image was placed in the shrine, where it
remained above an altar of the new-dedicated church,
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S
for nearly a hundred years before its transfer to St
Peter's. *
The Madonna, enshrined amidst agate, jasper, and lapis-
lazuli in the sumptuous Borghese Chapel at Sta Maria Mag-
giore, is said to be that carried by St Gregory the Great
in the penitential procession during the visitation of the
pestilence in 590. But another over the high altar of the
Church of the Ara Cæli, on the Capitol, asserts its rival
claims in the same history.
The Madonna of Sta Maria Nuova, near the Forum, was
brought from the East, byone of the Frangipani family after
the first Crusade : that painted within a niche in a lateral
chapel at San Gregorio (evidently retouched by modern
hands) is said to be the picture before which the same
sainted pontiff used to pray; that at Sta Benedetto in
Piscinula, a small Trasteverine church on the site of the
house of St Benedict, is said to have been contemplated in
the devotions of childhood by that great founder of mon-
asticism. A picture in the crypt of Sta Prassede, which is
referred by some to the eleventh, by others to the twelfth
century, is an early example of the Mother without the
Child, youthful, lovely and gorgeously apparelled, here
standing between the daughters of the Senator Pudens, Sta
Praxedis, and Sta Pudentiana. Fewamong these old pictures
of the Blessed Virgin in Rome can be allowed intrinsic merit,
and the greater number are anything but fair to look
upon, almost black, and very repulsive.
It is singular that no work of high art has ever become
the object of the sort of fetish-worship sanctioned in regard
* An opportunity having been afforded me of seeing this celebrated
image from a near point of view, I may express my persuasion that it
neither is nor can be anything else than an ancient but disagreeable
specimen of the ascetic Byzantine schools.
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Greek school in Rome, at the charming little basilica of
Sta Maria in Cosmedin, possesses other claims to notice
the life-size figures of the Mother and Child being in this
instance truly beautiful; the former distinguished by a
tender dignity and grave sweetness, the latter by childlike
loveliness; and though traditionally supposed one of the
many pictures imported during the Iconoclast persecution,
as the Greek inscription below seems to attest, the work
is ascribed by competent critics to some Italian pencil of
the twelfth century.
In the thirteenth century, Siena first, "the city of the
Virgin," and then Florence, gave birth to schools of
artists, transmitting regular traditions, and so entirely de-
voted to Christian subjects, that Buffalmacco, a pupil of the
illustrious Giotto, was able to say of himself and his fellow-
labourers : “We painters find our sole occupation in repre-
senting upon walls and altars the Saints of God, in order
that, beholding them, men may, to the great vexation of
demons, be excited to the more fervent practice of virtue
and piety."*
New food was furnished for their holy inspirations in the
great poem of Dante, and in the lives of the ever-blessed
Dominic and Francis of Assisi. The religious order of
which the latter was the founder, devoted as it specially
was to a life of contemplation, was peculiarly favourable
to the development and perfecting of Christian art.
Time rolled on; and while many discoveries and great
progress were made in the more mechanical departments
lore
*“Non attendiamo mai ad altro che a far santi e sante per le mura e
per le tavole, ed a far perciò con dispetto dei demonj gli nomini più
divoti e miglieri.”
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
of those arts subsidiary to architecture, the encouragement
given by the Medicis to pagan literature deprived painting
of its exclusively religious character. Here began the in-
vasion of paganism and naturalism into the domains of
art, and we may sorrowfully trace their every step ; not-
ing the influence they exercised over each school of paint-
ing and over the most celebrated artists : to those of
Umbria, who remained faithful to ideality and mystic
forms, we must pay a just tribute of praise ; nor must we
forget the anti-materialistic efforts of Savonarola to stem
this tide of paganism in the Middle Ages.
The rehabilitation of the Republic of Venice as a seat of
true poetical feeling, should not be overlooked. The local
dialect or patois, spoken by the inhabitants of the Lagunes,
though sweet to the ear, and simple and harmonious, is so
poor as to be totally without resources to express in be-
coming language a subject requiring strength and dignity.
Everything important was, on this account, for many cen-
turies written in Latin. Not only were all the public ora-
tions spoken in Latin, not only were Venetian history and
epic poetry written in Latin, but even the Divina Comedia
was translated by the Venetians into that tongue. Conse-
quently the terms “ Venetian Drama," " Venetian Epic,”
and so on, have an unusual and startling sound to the
ear. Not one out of a hundred scholars learned in the
tongues of Italy, ever dreamed of the existence of Venetian
poetry. But this existed nevertheless; and rich and pure
and noble was it under the forms of the legend and the
work of art.
Ecclesiastical painting flourished longer and later in
original purity at Venice than in the rest of Italy. Art was
there pre-eminently distinguished by religious feeling. Non
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nobis Domine, non nobis, sed Nomini tuo da gloriam, was the
habitualand repeated exclamation of the Venetian soldiersin
their wars against the infidels ; and in the pictures destined
to transmit to posterity the names and exploits of the doges,
they have caused themselves to be represented as kneeling
humbly before the Infant Saviour or His Blessed Mother.
Even in the worst days of Venice, in the time of the in-
famous Aretin, we find a dying doge choosing for his death-
bed the foot of the high altar in the Church of St Mark,
and saying, with his last breath : In manus Tuas, Domine,
commendo spiritum meum et rempublicam. Lord Houghton in
one of his poems thus expresses the feelings raised in his
mind by his researches at Venice :
< Prime model of a Christian Commonwealth,
Thou wise simplicity which present men
Calumniate, not conceiving; joy is mine
That I have read and learnt thee as I ought,
Not in the crude compiler's painted shell,
But in thine own memorials of live stone,
And in the pictures of thy kneeling princes,
And in the lofty words on lofty tombs,
And in the breath of ancient chronicles,
And in the music of the outer sea."
Christian art so far agrees with the Classical, that it takes
Nature for its guide and its model, but it exercises itself on
types altogether different, and has for its drift to interest
the moral sentiments, rather than to charm or flatter the
senses. As in the Greek art, certain types of human per-
fection were invented and worshipped, so also in Christian
art there arose an imitative system, in which were embodied,
under peculiar types, the faith, sentiments, and aspirations
of our divine religion. Christianity introduced a new stand-
ard of perfection in art, made that standard spiritual rather
1
105
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
than physical, and taught artists to aspire after a kind of
excellence which it is no figure of speech to say would
have been looked upon by the Greek as foolishness. The
one has its Jove, its Hercules, its Mars, its Venus and its
Graces--the representatives of majesty, physical power,
warlike courage, love and kindness; the other has its
Christ, its Apostles, its Doctors, its array of Martyrs, its
Virgin Mother, its graces, its virtues. Those graces and
virtues are in reality the complex types of self-abnegation.
Turning now to fresco as an ornamental adjunct to
architecture, we find that, between the Byzantine epoch,
when mural decoration could boast of the rich and solemn
effect produced by the use of mosaic inlay, and the revival
of the art of painting in the fifteenth century, there ex-
tends a long period, embracing the works of the Roman-
esque and Gothic styles.
As regards the first-named style, we find frequent re-
cords that painting was extensively employed as an internal
decoration, where mosaic-work could not be obtained ;
and we constantly come across notices during the eleventh
and twelfth centuries, of the walls of churches being
covered with painted subjects, illustrating the Sacred Writ-
ings or the lives of particular saints.
Amongst the names which preceded Cimabue in this
art, that of Giunta da Pisa heads the list, and I would
mention the Church of San Pietro in Grado, a little way
out of that city, as one of the best preserved and most
complete examples of his epoch, if not of his style, which
is now in existence.
Cimabue (1240-1300) formed a style transitional in
its character, which still retained most of the conventional
dispositions of mural decoration and figure-drawing, on
Со
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which, however, is grafted a return to natural models;
but to Giotto (1276-1336) is due the complete formation
of a new school, in which the style of Nature, and a certain
development of the antique Roman style, preponderate
over the conventionalities of the Byzantine school.
From this period may be dated the true revival of the
art of painting (principally in fresco) in Italy, in the
advancement of which stand prominently forward the
names of his contemporaries, pupils, and followers, such
as Simone Memmi of Siena (1276-1344), Taddeo Gaddi
of Florence (1300-1352), and Spinello Aretino of Arezzo
(1308-1400).
The general characteristics of this Italian Gothic, or
Giottesque style of mural decoration are-a dado, or base,
panelled with imitations of various marbles, contained
within borders painted in imitation of the glass-mosaic
work usually known as Opus Grecanicum, having at times
central designs of intricate geometrical and leaf ornament.
About 6 feet from the floor is a cornice with small
brackets or consoles, all radiating in perspective to a
central point of sight; above this the wall is divided into
large compartments, containing historical or religious
figure-subjects, the figures being strongly outlined, and
the colours flat and distinct, with but a slight use of chiaro-
scuro ; these compartments are also enclosed in painted
mosaic borders, and beneath each there is a description of
the subject illustrated, written in peculiar Gothic letters
of a very good style. The vaulting of the roof springs
immediately above these pictures, the only actual pro-
jection being one large central rib ornamented with wind-
ing foliage and mosaic borders, and painted mouldings to
carry it off more agreeably on to the flat surface of the
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
vaulted compartments, which are almost invariably painted
of a deep blue, studded with gold stars, and in the centre
of each of which are painted figures, usually holding
scrolls descriptive of their meaning. Sometimes the names
are written on the clouds beneath, from which they appear
to rise. The intersection of the ribs is marked by a gold
boss, carved and gilt, but not of great size, having in the
centre a hook, from which a lamp was suspended. The
ornament is generally a mixture of mosaic-work, Roman
reminiscences, especially in the painted mouldings, and
transcripts from Nature; the two first, however, being
prominent. The colours are well arranged, and the orna-
mental accessories, such as dresses, buildings, thrones,
armours, etc., are of great variety and beauty, and very
carefully executed. These remarks are applicable to the
Upper Church of St Francis at Assisi.
Such are the general characteristics of most of the mural
decoration in vogue up to the close of the fifteenth century,
as seen in the works of Orgagna at Pisa and Volterra, of the
Lorenzetti and Bartoli at Siena, and in the several Italian
schools of Italy. And although the works of Paolo Vecellio,
Masaccio, Ghirlandaio and Signorelli present many points
of divergence, the principal feature being the greater im-
portance attached to the historical subjects, and a very
superior style of execution, yet it is not until the time of
Peruginothat we find a completely different systemadopted,
and to him appears to be certainly due the introduction of
a style in every way superior, which was extended and im-
proved by his contemporaries and pupils, amongst whom
Pinturicchio and Raffaele are most prominent.
In English Gothic, painting was always subordinate to
architecture; it was used to bring out and accentuate the
as us
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mouldings and sculpture, and to cover the blank spaces.
Every piece of blank wall, or vault, or ceiling, was a ground
for the painter to work upon, and every wall was prepared
for this purpose with a thin coat of fine plaster. Is not this
practice more consistent with architecture than the Italian
fashion? The Italians were always very good painters, but
very bad architects, and they knew their own strong point
The English were among the best architects in the world,
but perhaps the worst painters, and they acted accordingly.
Around the walls of the Chapel of the Santissimo Cor-
porale, in Orvieto Cathedral, is a remarkable series of fres-
coes, restored about forty-five years ago, in great part, I
was told, wholly repainted, that form in the aggregate a
most curious, though not either original or beautiful, series
of designs. They might be styled the Transubstantiation
series. Their artist was Ugolino di Prete Ilario (else little
known), who was assisted in this task by two others,
Dominico di Meo, and the friar, Giovanni Leonardelli, by
which fellow-labourers these paintings were completed in
1363. We here see, in all its acts, the Bolsena Miracle,
and the transfer of the sacred objects to Orvieto, these scenes
being copied by the fresco painters from the enamels on the
reliquary. Besides these are various miracles and visions,
tending to illustrate the same sacramental doctrine as that
considered to be triumphantly indicated by the event at
Bolsena. Twice do we see the visible transformation of the
Host, at Mass, into an Infant holding a cross ; once in the
hand of the priest at the elevation, again actually walking
upon the altar during the rite.
Other subjects, admitted in this chapel as sacramentalin
their mystical reference or hidden meaning are : the gather-
ing of manna in the desert, the meeting between Abraham
109
upon her subjects, adme or hidden meania between Abrahan
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
and Melchisedec, that patriarch entertaining thethree angels,
the angel appearing to Elias, Elias ascending Mount Horeb,
the Last Supper, the Crucifixion, the Vision of Christ in
the Apocalypse, and, in another range, purely legendary,
St Paul kneeling before an altar on which are placed the
sacramental elements, St Augustine beholding a vision of
Our Lord with the Chalice and Host, St Thomas Aquinas
kneeling before the crucifix that spoke to him, also a singu-
lar allegory of the victory of Faith over the world, the flesh
and the devil-a warrior on a white horse passing over the
prostrate and naked body of a woman, while aiming a dart
at a demon who lurks in the distance. Besides these groups
are introduced, accessorially, the figures of all the Fathers
and Doctors whose writings emphatically maintain thedoc-
trine of the Roman Church of the Real Presence.
By the same artist, Ilario, and six other assistants, was
painted the series of frescoes covering the walls and vault
of the choir at Orvieto the legend of Joachim and Anna,
the Life and Assumption of the Virgin, the Apostles, each
with a clause of the Creed, Doctors and Pontiffs, now in
many parts faded, not yet touched by the restorer.
Inthe CortoneseLuca Signorelli(1439-1521) we have the
Michael Angelo of the fifteenth century. He was the pupil
of Piero della Francesca, a celebrated painter of Padua,
whose realistic treatment of the nude won him great fame.
Signorelli surpassed his master, especially after having come
under the influence of the Florentine school. Well ac-
quainted with the anatomy of the human frame, he soon
acquired the faculty to idealise his figures, and to infuse
poetry into the treatment of Nature. His imagination was
as colossal as that of Angelo, but in his execution he was not
so powerful. The placing of the nude body in the most
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difficult positions was not only attempted, but carried out
to great perfection by Signorelli. He was one of the dis-
tinguished artists who decorated the Sistine Chapel of the
Vatican, and amongst the foremost in composition. But his:
real genius displayed itself in all its grandeur in the frescoes.
with which he enriched the Capella della Madonna di San
Brizio, in Orvieto Cathedral. The space was filled in with
representations of the Doom. Fiesole decorated part of the
IM
phets. Benozzo filled in the apostles and martyrs, and
Signorelli added his mighty group of the bodies called upon
by angels, with the blast of the trumpet, to rise and appear
before the “Rex tremendæ Majestatis,” to have their des-
tiny decided for ever. The belief in the immortality of the
soul is to be traced to the Orientals. They believed, how-
ever, in a spiritual and universal immortality of that part
in man which is imponderable, eternal, ethereal.
The Egyptians worked out the idea of the special immor-
tality of the body and soul. With them, the mummy was to
be revived again, and to either suffer eternal punishment
or enjoy everlasting happiness. The condemned were to:
drag their heads after them, or to suffer terrible tortures;
they were to be torn asunder or sawn into small pieces, ima
paled or burnt. Similar conceptions haunted people's im-
agination, especially during the fifteenth and sixteenth.
centuries, in which periods men thought more of the evil
spirit and his myrmidons than of the more cheerful features.
of Christian love and forbearance. Artists began to revel in
scenes of horror. Their painted homilies aimed more at,
terrifying and overawing humanity than at rendering the
bright and comforting side of Christianity. In contrasting
The Last Judgment of Signorelli at Orvieto, with its.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
innumerable nude men and women, skeletons, angels, with
the same treatment in the Panathenaic procession of the
Parthenon, we may study with the greatest advantage the
difference between classic and romantic art A joyous care-
lessness, combined with a harmonious and idealised beauty,
is the element of classic composition, whilst the romantic
school of the fifteenth century spiritualises in every indi-
vidual woe and fear. In the productions of the Florentine
artist, every limb, every sinew, every nerve, trembles with
hope or despair.
The forms are those of human beings, but the spirit
animating them has been nourished in subterranean vaults
and crypts. In these frescoes at Orvieto, fleshless and eye-
less skulls are struggling to find their limbs; skeletons
crawl with ghastly effort to detach themselves from Mother
Earth, whilst men and women cluster in groups, embrac-
ing one another or standing boldly out, seem to defy that
stuba mirum” that disturbs their long slumber.
In many figures we discern a charming astonishment, es-
pecially in some beautiful women, greeting the reality of
the world once more. Life and light, joy and hope, vivify
their bodies. The groups in the background are composed
of those who, after a long separation, meet again, side by
side, not only in the spirit, but also in the flesh. In these
groups, as well as in the single figures, Signorelli has
shown an immense power of treating the human form, not
with an over-anxious striving at a correct reproduction of
anatomical lines, but with ideal grandeur, elevating his
works to impressive scenes of tranquil beatitude.
Signorelli was the direct predecessor of Michael Angelo,
without, however, attaining his almost superhuman force.
It is, however, to be regretted that this great Cortonese
II2
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artist often sacrifices beauty to bold attempts to place parts
some upturned faces, into contorted positions, contrary
to all the laws of æsthetics.
Naturalness and realism often have too firm a hold over
his good taste and ideal strivings, and though it is impos-
sible not to admire his power of imagination, we feel hurt
by some of his forms. Winged angelic heads, looking like
bats filling the air, are neither improving nor pleasant.
Doubly so is a group of lively skeletons holding a meet-
overdone in their muscular sharpness, and some are really
quite acrobatic in the contortions of their limbs. Faults
like these must, however, be attributed more to the subject
which, in itself, has so many elements to induce the im-
agination of the artist to attempt the impossible, because
he has to blend into one the finite and infinite, life and
death, the earthly and the heavenly. When a supernatural
subject is to be brought within the compass of natural
forms it leads the artist, often against his will, to an over-
crowding of figures, an exaggerated effort towards placing
his forms in positions never before attempted, and thus
reduces him to vehement and fantastic conceptions, as-
tonishing and surprising us more than satisfying our sense
of beauty.
Harmony and moderation are neglected—we feel be-
wildered, but not satisfied, astonished, but not elevated,
at this wonderful Last Judgment in the Capella della
Madonna at Orvieto, which, occupying a position corre-
sponding to that of the Santissimo Corporale, is, if I may so
Fra Giovanni Angelico was commissioned, in 1447, to
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8
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
adorn its walls with frescoes illustrating the Last Judg-
ment, which, assisted by Benozzo Gozzoli, he commenced
without delay ; but on the completion of two pictures on
the quadripartitely vaulted roofs, the Saviour amidst ador-
ing Angels, and the Company of the Prophets, he quitted
Orvieto, never to return. We may feel the greater admira-
tion for the fruits of his genius here before us when we
remember that they were produced within the short inter-
val, from the 15th of June to the 18th of September 1447,
after which date the artist returned to Rome, in order to
complete the paintings commenced in the Vatican. An en-
gagement with Perugino for the Orvieto series was never
carried out by that artist, and it was not until half a cen-
tury afterwards that Luca Signorelli finished, after less
than a year's labour, the exquisite groups of the Beati-
fied, Martyrs and Apostles, that pertain to the same great
argument commenced by Angelico ; and at the beginning
of the year 1500, the former artist offered to undertake
the paintings on the walls of the same chapel-subjects,
the Story of Antichrist and the Resurrection—which
were first exhibited, probably in completeness, on the Festi-
val of the Assumption, 1502. In Angelico's part of this
series, the Saviour in Judgment is a sublime figure, and
though in an attitude that seems to menace the wicked,
not without a benignant beauty suited to this divine sub-
ject-different indeed from the stern and repulsive aspect
of the Judge in Michael Angelo's picture, though the atti-
tude of this chief figure is almost copied by the later artists
from Fra Giovanni.
And beautiful indeed, whilst embodying a lofty ideal of
their themes, are the other groups on this vault, due to the
pencils of Gozzoli and Signorelli—the “Casta Virginum
m
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mass
Cohors,” the “Doctorum sapiens Ordo,” and the Angels
with the instruments of the Passion.
Having passed a few criticisms on Signorelli's master-
piece-the Fate of Antichrist, and the scenes of the
General Resurrection-I will offer a few remarks on the
theological bearings of these celebrated pictures. The con-
ception of the Antichrist seems to unite the personality
of such an heresiarch as Arius with that of a sanguinary
innovator, offering death or conversion, like Mohammed;
and it is remarkable that the aspect of the arch-deceiver
rather resembles the type commonly given in art to the
Saviour, as if with the intent to depict the last great de-
fection from faith as a heresy founded on a delusive resem-
blance, not a declared antagonism to Christianity. Among
the victims of a massacre, which appears to have been just
perpetrated, we see the body of a young monk with a
cloven skull; and elsewhere, in auxiliary groups, ecclesi-
astics are seen consulting the Scriptures or other ortho-
dox writings, evidently with the intent to refute the false
teachers, nowhere prominent among the deluded disciples
of that teacher. Herein we have proof that the artist's mind
was not possessed by any idea analogous to the theories
already broached in his time, and carried further to the last
consequences by the first Protestants. Before the close of
the fifteenth century severe strictures had been passed, and
darkest imputations made against the Roman Curia.
The throne of St Peter was now filled by Alexander
VI. ; the Christian world was palpitating in expectation of
a great religious movement, necessitated by great abuses.
Yet no attempt is there, in the remarkable art-works at
Orvieto, to brand the Pope or the Roman Church with com-
plicity in the cause, or identity with the person of Anti-
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
christ. It is satisfactory to see also, in these paintings, how
art emancipates itself from mediæval tradition in rejecting
altogether the grotesque.
Signorelli's demon figures are ghastly and terrible, but
not monstrous; and though the arch-fiend, who whispers
in the ear of Antichrist while the latter is preaching to a
crowd, is indeed distinguished by red horns, his personisnot
otherwise alien to the human. Signorelli's angels are grand,
powerful, majestic; with bright-coloured, far-spreading
wings, and either light, floating drapery or (as those that
menace the reprobate) clad in complete armour; they want
the graceful spirituality of the angels imagined by Fra Gio-
vanni, Gozzoli and Ghirlandajo, and seem a creation medi-
ate between those fair forms of an earlier school and the
muscular Titans of Buonarotti.
An interesting story is associated with the episode in
Signorelli's “Inferno”-the group, namely, of a demon
with a wretched woman on his back flying down into the
abyss. A female of abandoned life recognised her own por-
trait in that victim, and was converted ; led thenceforth
to forsake sin, through the impression of horror made on
her mind by this picture.
There are some very beautiful and interesting fresco-
paintings in the Duomo at Prato, which as that town is
so frequently passed over by travellers from Florence to
Pistoja, though it is in every way deserving of a visit,
are briefly described here, in preference to the more widely-
known examples at Assisi and elsewhere.
Those in the choir are by Filippo Lippi, dating from
1470, and considered his best works. They represent in-
cidents from the lives of St John the Baptist and St Stephen.
The two lower compartments on either side are occupied
Wn e
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by two grand pictures. On the right, the Daughter of
Herodias dancing before Herod, on the left the Death
and Burial of St Stephen. Above, in smaller compartments,
are the Birth of St John, his Withdrawal to the Wilderness,
and his Preaching; the Birth of St Stephen, and his Ordina-
tion to the Diaconate. These pictures are treated in a
bold style, free from the archaism of earlier works, but
hardly so suitable for decoration as the style of Giotto or
even of Masaccio.
In the centre of the large picture representing Herod's
Birthday Feast is a table with figures. Herodias is at a
smaller table, in front of which her daughter kneels while
presenting the charger. On the other side she is repre-
sented as skipping about after the manner of a ballet-girl.
There is a certain amount of elegance in the figure of the
daughter, and it is supposed by some that the floating
draperies of the latter figure show the handiwork of Filip-
pino, the son of Filippo. In the Interment of St Stephen,
which is represented as taking place in the interior of a
basilica, there are three heads of great beauty—those of
angels or youths, kissing the feet of the Proto-Martyr.
Some of the figures are portraits-one that of the painter
The two chapels nearest the choir in Prato Cathedral
are frescoed in an earlier style, but have been quite ruined
by repainting. Another chapel is decorated by a modern
painter of Prato of great talent, Franchi by name. Although
the character of the figures is too modern to suit the en-
vironments, the general effect is fairly good; the drawing
is excellent, and in some of the groups the expressions and
attitudes suggest Andrea del Sarto’s happiest efforts.
On the left hand of the principal entrance to Prato
Cathedral is the chapel of the Sacra Cintola, with frescoes
coes
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
by Angelo Gaddi, dating from the decade of the fourteenth
century, and of superior merit. Unfortunately the chapel
is so dark that it is difficult to decipher the subjects, which
represent scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary. A pro-
cession with an architectural background in one of the
divisions is perhaps the most remarkable of these pictures.
Among the manifold treasures of art with which Florence
is so liberally endowed, the frescoes in the Dominican Con-
vent of San Marco must not be forgotten. They belong
to that holy school of painting in which the blessed An-
gelico is the acknowledged master, and are from the brush
of that chief of Christian painters.
Space, however, can only be found here for a very brief
description of two of these works, the Transfiguration of
Our Lord and the Coronation of the Blessed Virgin.
In the first, Our Lord is represented in an aureole of
pale light, contrasted with a golden ground. His attitude
is symbolical : His sacred arms being extended—as upon
the Cross-embracing the whole world. His vestment,
most majestically draped, is, as is usual with the Blessed
Angelico—at least when representing Our Lordas glorified
--pure white. The nimbus is cruciferous. The heads of
Moses and Elias are alone seen. The three Apostles are in
attitudes of awe and veneration.
At the side are mystically introduced the Blessed Virgin
and St Dominic (the founder of the painter's order) in
adoration. In some particulars Raffaele may be supposed
to have imitated this painting in his celebrated Transfigura-
tion in the Vatican.
In the Coronation scene Our Lord, vested in white, with
cruciferous nimbus, and seated on clouds, is represented
as placing a crown on His Blessed Mother who, vested
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ar
en
also in white, with plain nimbus, and hands crossed on
her breast, most meekly inclines towards Him to receive
it. Below, in adoration, are seen St Dominic, St Francis
of Assisi, and St Benedict (the founders of three of the
greatest and most importantorders in the Catholic Church);
St Thomas Aquinas and St Peter Martyr, both Domini-
cans; and one other saint, which most writers, without
giving authority, describe as St Jerome, although he is
not vested as is usual with that Doctor of the Church.
The frescoes in the vestibule or atrium of the church
and conventual buildings of the Annunziata at Florence
are of high merit. Many of them are by Andrea del Sarto,
and the subjects of several are drawn from the life of an
eminent saint, Filippo Benizzi. One of them is a curious
instance of the power of religious bigotry to destroy the
simplest elements of Christian morality. The saint is walk-
ing in the country. Some gay young men, playing at cards
under a tree, jeer at his uncouth appearance; whereupon,
he prays to Heaven, and the youths are struck with light-
ning. It is strange that ecclesiastics who invent such fables,
and cause them to be painted, do not reflect that nine men
out of ten who read such legends, and look upon such
representations, will keep one half the lesson and throw
away the other—will take the vengeance and reject the
saintly life. Our Blessed Lord, with lips convulsed with
the agony of the cross, prayed that His murderers might
be forgiven, but His disciples limit their forgiveness to sins
which they themselves have committed.
In one of the cloisters of this church is the Madonna
del Sacco of Andrea del Sarto, a fresco painting of great
merit, not only in drawing and colouring, but from the
simple originality of the design. It brings out more fully
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the human element than is usual in the treatment of this
subject. It is a family-father, mother, and child-dis-
posed in a natural group, not as if sitting for their por-
traits, but as if the artist had looked in upon them when
they were unaware.
This painting—a copy of which lies before me as I write
-is in the tympanum of a doorway, and is very sweet
and graceful, though I believe that by some it is considered
to be deficient in dignity.
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CHAPTER III
The Arts Subsidiary to Architecture-II. (Sculpture)
THE art of the architect and that of the sculptor are
so intimately allied, neither in their highest develop-
ments being ever so perfect without the aid of the other,
that it is incumbent upon the student of the latter, if he
would excel, to know much more than merely a little about
architecture. The arts of architecture, sculpture and paint-
ing are indeed all dependent on each other. The most per-
fect building is that in which not only the architectural
lines, proportions and features are all good and beautiful
in themselves, but the one in which provision is thought-
fully and wisely made by the architect for the best display
in harmony of the arts of painting and sculpture. The
architect deals with outlines and masses, with light and
shade; but for that deeper interest which touches one most
after, these general effects have been produced, he depends
except in the vastest buildings, upon the other arts, and he
must know and feel enough about them to make him com-
petent to provide for their worthy and dignified treatment.
And surely it is not less needful that the painter and the
sculptor should be so well trained in architectural detail as
to make it impossible for them to do or admire work in
which ignorance of that art is exhibited—such ignorance
being fatal in its effect wherever it exists or is conspicuous.
About the middle of the thirteenth century, when the de-
velopment of sculpture began in Tuscany, the people of
that part of Italy were just emerging from the mediæval
1
I21
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL, ITALY
-
idea of life as a weary pilgrimage. They were men of strong
emotions, and whose passions found vent in continual fac-
tion fights and revolutions, yet whose love of order is mani-
fest even in these revolutions. These opposing character-
istics of licence and restraint are reflected in their art, faintly
at first, but up to the end of the fifteenth century continu.
ally gaining in strength.
The landscape, too, was not without its effect. The
country is a rich and fertile one, but not with the richness
of English woodland, meadow and nestling village, still less
with the luxuriance of Southern Italy—the Italy of our
dreams. Dusty-leaved olive-trees feather the rolling hills,
supporting festooned vines, and shimmering with every
breath of wind. Clothed with the vine and olive, the tree
of peace and the fruit of gladness, and yet the most strik-
ing object on those hills, the little towns perched on their
crests have still about them an atmosphere of warlike de-
fiance, which tells of “old, unhappy, far-off things, and
battles long ago.” Equally characteristic of the country
are the tall dark cypresses, ranged in funereal procession,
or standing apart in proud and lonely state above the olive
gardens, imparting a certain solemn air to the landscape,
which not even the brilliant sunshine can overcome, and
which it is difficult to disassociate from that similar pensive
element that runs through Tuscan art.
For hundreds of years before the epoch to which I have
alluded, painting and sculpture had remained practically
inert. Better than any illustration of their condition is a
reading of a MS., written for the guidance of artists, by
a monk of Mount Athos in the twelfth century-an MS.,
which it is hardly possible any Tuscans of that time ever
saw, but which perfectly suggests the spirit of their art.
122

LUCCA : THE FONT IN SAN FREDIANO
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Supposing an artist is desiring of portraying, let us say,
the Birth of the Blessed Virgin, he is told to paint, first,
head resting on a pillow. Two attendants must be intro-
duced to support her from behind, and one to stir the air
with a fan. A woman carrying dishes is to pass out at the
door; lower down in the picture others are to be repre-
sented washing the infant in a basin, and another woman,
again, rocking the infant in a cradle. In this stereotyped
form, hundreds of pictures were painted, and people under-
stood their meaning more by tradition than by any lifelike
expression of character in them. At that time art was little
more than decorative symbolism; a shape bearing a rough
resemblance to a man, with almond-shaped eyes and ex-
pressionless mouth, if possessed of a double-pointed beard
and frizzled hair, and holding a cross and closed scroll, re-
presented an apostle, and his name was generally inscribed
beside him, to preclude the possibility of a mistake, for the
same rough semblance of a man, if only he were bald, with
a large beard, and with a ladder or a bush instead of the
cross, he might be Jacob or Moses.
Art in Italy was in a very similar condition before the
time of Niccola Pisano. It was often very beautiful within
narrowlimits, in simplicity or grace of outline, in decorative
distribution of figures; but still, little more than symbolic.
Traditional modes of representing scenes and people which
were comprehended by the multitude, were followed by ar-
tists, who cared very little whether any small amount of ex-
pression which might creep by accident into the faces or
attitudes of their figures was, or was not, in agreement
with the facts they tried to record. The people, in fact, had
developed while art had degenerated, until at last there was
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
ripe for an artistic advance; all that was wanted being an
artist strong enough to throw aside the trammels of con-
ventionalism. Thus, until the great revival of plastic art
took place under the Pisani in the thirteenth century,
Italian sculpture was actually the work of northern sculp.
tors, as, for instance, the group in the lintel of the western
doorway of San Andrea at Pistoja, executed in 1186 by
Gruamon, and his brother Adeodatus. Unlike the sculpture
of the Pisani, and later artists, these early figures at Pistoja,
and a relief by Benedetto Antelami for the pulpit of Parma
Cathedral in 1178, are quite secondary to the architecture
they are designed to decorate; evidently they are the work
of men who were architects first and sculptors in a secon-
dary degree.
The popular idea, universal not so very long since, and
still lingering in odd corners, which insists upon judging
the mediæval sculptors by a comparison with those of an-
cient Greece, shows infinite ignorance and impatience of
learning. The schemes of the systems were totally distinct,
our duty is to see if each acted up to its principle, and to
recognise that the Gothic artist was in that respect not in-
ferior to his predecessor. It must never be forgotten that
the Phidian carvers, in whose hands sculpture, per se, cul-
minated, in decorating the Parthenon departed from their
office as subordinates, to become great artists themselves;
and it is a question whether the greater part of their trans-
cendent genius was not wasted upon statues placed where
they could not be fairly seen, and in spaces which archi-
tectonic sculpture would have filled with equal use and
truer application. Some are so bold as to say that the
Theseus and Ilissus were never seen as they ought to be
ca
e
124
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
seen until the British Museum received them. Undoubt-
edly the marvellous execution of such works was wholly
lost, they would have been better fitted for the phyplo-
theca of Pericles than the pediment of Minerva, in which
architectonic sculptures would have had as much expression
as the noblest productions of the noblest sculptor.
In such situations, the thing primarily demanded is ex-
pression; this may be had from the rudest or the most re-
stricted works. Those of Egypt are probably most rigidly
conventionalised, yet certainly inferior to none in awful
expressiveness; the grand sweetness of the faces that have
watched by the cave of Abou-Simbel for so many thousand
years rivals the dignity of the Phidian Jupiter, and excels
it in simplicity. When these demands of expression and
suggestive indication are perfectly answered, architectonic
sculpture, as at Wells or Rheims, or Naumburg, or Pistoja,
may be said to have most loyally done its office. To say
that Gothic sculpture does not equal that of Greece in
representation of flesh or knowledge of the human form, is
simply to confess oneself ignorant of its purpose and his-
tory; and quite as preposterous it would be to challenge
the antique, because it neglected the expression of the
human face-in dealing with which Gothic art surpassed all
others for a set, emotional ideal.
At Groppoli, three miles west of Pistoja, is one of the
completest monuments of the twelfth century, in the shape
of a pulpit. Like those in San Bartolommeo and San Gio-
vanni at Pistoja, it is quadrangular, and the faces represent
in low reliefs of soft stone incidents from the New Testa-
ment—the Visitation, Nativity, and Flight into Egypt.
A serpent at one of the angles supports the desk. The pul-
pit rests on two columns, whose capitals are filled with heads
125
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
of animals and monsters, and whose bases are supported on
the backs of lions. Of the latter, one paws a man, the other
a dragon. A mutilated inscription may be read as follows:
“Hoc opus fecit fieri hoc opus (sic) Guiscondus. Pleb anno
dñi MIE CLXXXXIII.” *
Defective as those of Gruamon's in the lintel of the west-
ern doorway of San Andrea at Pistoja, Buonamico's figures
on this pulpit at Groppoli are cut into the flat without any
sort of rounding. The incidents are in the old traditional
forms, but represented by one living in the infancy of art.
The figures, like slender dolls, have draperies marked by
rectangular or circular incisions. The flat square heads form
but one plane with the neck; their limbs hang, as it were,
by threads together, the features being merely scratched on
the surface.
About the close of the twelfth century, Buonamico seems
to have been extremely busy at Pisa. Bas-reliefs that may
be assigned to him on the curved cornices and frieze of the
eastern portal of the Baptistery represent the Redeemer,
the Virgin and St John, with Apostles and Angels. The same
flat surface, the same forms indicated by incisions may be
noted there as at Groppoli, and perfect identity of style
with a tomb in the Campo Santo discloses the artist whose
name is inscribed thus :-
« Opus quod videtis, Bonusamicus fecit; P. eo. orate.”
This pulpit at Groppoli is a sort of point de départin pulpit
sculpture. There is a much earlier one in Florence, of
which a print may be found in Richa's work on the churches.
That the construction and adornment of pulpits occupied
considerably the sculptors of the thirteenth and fourteenth
* The MIX for Mille is often found thus on old inscriptions.
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centuries, is apparent in those at Florence and Pisa, and
more especially in three found in the churches of Pistoja
a city so seldom visited by strangers that its innumerable
interesting works are comparatively unknown.
In Pistoja the earliest of its three remarkable pulpits is
in the Church of San Bartolommeo. As attested by the in-
scription carved on it, this pulpit was finished in 1250 by
Guido da Como. It is thought that Guido left it unfinished,
and that two of the groups, much inferior to the others,
were from the chisel of one Turisano. It is of white marble,
carved with eight stories in bas-relief-six of which are in
front and two on either side. It stands on three columns
against the wall of the south aisle. The first column on the
lisk which he is in vain attempting to crush; that on the
right rests upon a lioness suckling her young ; while the
central pillar is supported by a man carved in white Sera-
tolommeo ranks second among the Pistojan ones in the
history of art. The front of the pulpit, i.e., the one facing
the nave, has six oblong panels containing as many minute
groups in two rows, among which may be deciphered the
Nativity and the Circumcision; the Charge to St Peter and
the Incredulity of St Thomas.
The most beautiful of Pistoja's pulpits, though the latest
in date, and the one most celebrated in art history, is that
in San Andrea; but placed as it is within one of the arches
on the north side of a very narrow, dark, Romanesque
church, it is hardly seen to advantage, but the eye is at once
struck with the beauty of its form and detail. There is no
doubt of the authenticity of this pulpit, for, “Giovanni, son
of Niccola, born at Pisa,” is proudly written in characteristic
127
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
S
Gothic letters upon it. It bears a striking resemblance to
the one in the Baptistery at Pisa, but is characterised by
greater delicacy. Out of regard that the Pistojans had for
Niccola Pisano, they confided the construction of this
pulpit to his son Giovanni, who excelled his father in
the delicacy of his work. It stands about 12 feet high, is
about 21 feet in circumference, and supported on seven
columns (in allusion to the mystical Biblical number of
thin red marble from the Pisan mountains. Four of these
columns seem to have scarcely any support; three have their
base, one on the shoulder of a man, a fifth on the back of
a crouching lioness, the sixth on a lion with a horse under
him, while the central shaft is on a base flanked bytwo eagles
and supported by a lion. All these figures are Scriptural and
allegorical. The Nativity, Epiphany, Massacre of the Inno-
cents, Crucifixion, and Last Judgment, are the five subjects
represented on the pulpit, with endless variety of expression
and design. About one hundred and fifty figures can be
counted in relief, besides the beautifully worked angles,
the figures in which are about i foot 6 inches long. The
execution of this marvellous piece of work occupied four
years (1298-1301).
In the Epiphany scene, Giovanni drew upon his father's
design with considerable freedom, but with a totally differ-
ent effect. In both cases the panels are overcrowded; but
Niccola has, to some extent, neutralised this ill effect by
the skilful manner in which he composed his masses. The
son, on the other hand, has accentuated it by his spotty
treatment of light and shade, and by his introduction of
the incident of the dream of the Wise Men, thereby weaken-
ing what should be the focus of attention in this panel. In
the figure of the Angel standing before the Blessed Virgin
128

EEEE
LUCCA : WEST FRONT OF SAN FREDIANO.
PISTOJA: INTERIOR OF SAN ANDREA.
(Showing the Pulpit by Gior. Pisano.)
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
there is a decided soupçon of the Classic element; but
there is sufficient romanticism in the manner in which the
foremost king takes the crown from his head and hangs
iton his arm instead of kneeling in the conventional manner,
to impart a character to the whole panel.
We perceive a naturalism, too, in such small detailsasthe
arrangement of the hair--curls grouped in an orderly man-
ner, with centres drilled in the Byzantine fashion, being
superseded by loosely flowing locks, while the draperies, if
less artistically designed than Niccola's, are disposed in
freer and more natural folds.
It is, however, to the works of Giovanni Pisano's scho-
lars-Andrea Pisano, Lorenzo Maitani, and others--that
we must look for a fuller union between the Classic and
the romantic elements, as for instance those on the four
panels between the western doors of Orvieto Cathedral and
the gates of the Baptistery at Florence.
Opinions are greatly divided about these four marvellous
series of subjects on the Orvietan façade, but their style and
their commencement only a short time before the death
of Giovanni Pisano completely nullifies the assertion of
Vasari that they were Giovanni's work, though evidencing
much of the feeling of his school.
Comparing the Annunciation and Nativity groups at
Orvieto with the earlier treatment of the same subjects at
Pistoja, a great advance is perceptible. That the sculptor,
whoever he was, had studied Giovanni's panel is very clear,
for the attitudes are all reproduced, particularly those of
the Virgin as she lifts the coverlet of the Divine Child; of
the attendants who are preparing the bath; of St Joseph,
and of the Virgin before the Angel Gabriel. At Orvieto,
however, that jarring, spotty light and shade does not
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
offend us as in the pulpit at San Andrea Pistoja ; all here is
in the most admirable order. .
The name of the artist of that beautiful pulpit of white
marble in the Church of San Giovanni Fuorcivitas at Pisa
toja was for some time disputed. Vasari pronounced it to
be from the hands of a German artist; Campi, from those
of a Lombard ; Morrona, the work of Giovanni Pisano.
That it is a work of the Pisano school is certain, and it is
now decided that it is from the hands of Fra Guglielmo of
Pisa, a Dominican, and pupil and fellow-worker with Nic-
cola Pisano. Like that in San Bartolommeo, the pulpit in
San Giovanni stands against the southern wall of the nave,
and is oblong in shape.
The eastern side has been cut to form an entrance into
the pulpit. Ten different sacred stories are carved upon it,
with six apostles at the division of the compartments. In
the front is the Angel of the Apocalypse, under which was
a face enamelled in gold covered with crystals. The pulpit
stands on two columns, which are based on lions killing
out of the wall behind. The figures are sculptured with ex-
quisite art and tenderness, the more so when the crowded
groups are considered. The capitals to the shafts, with little
birds lurking among the leaves, are especially beautiful.
There are three book-desks, facing north, north-east and
north-west. The middle desk rests on an eagle, under which
are the three other evangelistic symbols : the other desks
are supported by saints. The whole bears a striking resem-
blance to the Pisan Baptistery pulpit, and was executed in
1270, thus forming a connecting link between those in
San Bartolommeo and San Andrea.
In 1398 it was restored by Francesco da Siena, and in
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
1837 by Prof. Stefano Ricci. It can, however, except on a
very bright day, be but imperfectly seen, owing to the in-
adequacy of light in this church, which is a long aisleless
parallelogram, with very deep, rich, modern-stained glass
in the windows, of Geometrical Decorated character, which
have been inserted in the southern and eastern walls of
this late Romanesque church.
The history of Italian sculpture of the best period may be
interwoven with some details of the celebrated Pisani family.
This best period did not enter upon its career until the
third decade of the thirteenth century, in the person of
Niccola Pisano, who, though he called himself a Pisan from
Pisa, where most of his life was spent, was not a native of
that city.
There are two distinct accounts of his parentage, both
derived mainly from existing documents. According to one
of these, he is said to have been the son of “ Petrus, a not-
ary of Siena," but this statement rests upon very dubious
authority, especially as the word “Siena” or “de Senis"
appears to be a conjectural addition. Another document
among the archives of the Siena Duomo speaks of him as
son of “ Petrus de Apulia.”
Crowe and Cavalcaselle, as well as the majority of mod-
ern writers, accept the latter statement, and believe that he
not only was a native of the province of Apulia, in South
Italy, but also that he gained there his early instruction
in the art of sculpture and architecture.
Those on the other hand who, with most of the older
writers, prefer to accept the theory of Niccola's origin be-
ing Tuscan, suppose he was a native of a small town called
Apulia, near Lucca. As is the case with biographies of
many of those artists who lived long before the time of
131
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Vasari, that author's account of Niccola is not to be relied
upon. There is no doubt that in the century preceding
Niccola Pisano's birth, Apulia and the southern provinces
generally, were more advanced in the plastic art than any
part of Northern Italy----witness especially the magnificent
architecture and sculpture in the Cathedrals of Salerno,
Bari, Amalfi, Ravello, and many others, in which still exist
bronze doors, marble pulpits, and other works of great
merit, dating from the eleventh and twelfth centuries, a
period when North Italy produced but little art work of
any high order. There can be no doubt that young Nic-
cola saw and was impressed by these works, but in the
eagerness to contradict old traditions, Crowe and Cavalca-
selle go out of their way to deny the story told by Vasari,
of Pisano's admiration for and keen study of the remains
of ancient Roman sculpture, which were then beginning to
be sought for and appreciated.
It is somewhat difficult to trace the direct influence of
Apulian art in Niccola Pisano's works, while in many of
them, especially bas-reliefs of his Pisan pupils, classical
feeling is apparent in every fold of drapery, in the model-
ling of the nude, and a dignified reserve of the main lines
of the composition.
This fact supports the theory of Niccola's southern
origin, though not perhaps very strongly, as some years
before, the Pisan Bonnanus had been chosen by the Nor-
man King as the sculptor to cast one of the bronze doors
for Monreale Cathedral, where it still exists. The earliest
piece of sculpture attributed to Pisano extant is a relief
of the Deposition from the Cross in the tympanum of
the arch of one of the side doorways at San Martino
Lucca; it is remarkable for its graceful composition and
132
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE :
delicate finish of execution. Its date is known to be
1237.
If we are to credit the statement that when only about
fifteen years old, the Emperor Frederick II. made him his
architect and took him to Naples, where he was employed
on the castle Frederick was building there, Pisano must
have been a prodigy of genius. Ten or twelve years later
we hear of his going to Padua to build the great church
of San Antonio there ; then to Arezzo, to build a church
for the newly-established Dominican Order.
It was not, however, until 1260 that Niccola Pisano
finished the marble pulpit for the Pisa Baptistery. This is
one of his most highly refined works, and we have only to
examine it carefully to convince ourselves of the assiduity
with which he had studied Classic models. In almost every
panel Greek figures are reproduced, but the solemn gran-
deur of the originals, well preserved in Niccola's figures,
harmonises admirably with Byzantine tradition.
Niccola's next important work was the Arca di San
Domenico (the Shrine of St Dominic) in the great church
sarcophagus, covered with reliefs of subjects from the life
of the saint, is the work of Pisano's pupils.
Niccola's most magnificent work, if not his happiest, is
the pulpit in the choir of Siena Cathedral. It is much larger
than that at Pisa, though on the same motif, being an octagon
on cusped arches and columns. Its staircase and alarge land-
ing at the top, with curved balusters and panels, was not
added until the beginning of the sixteenth century.
The chief fault of Pisano's pulpit at Siena is its over-
loading with sculpture, and each relief is far too crowded
with figures. An attempt to gain magnificence of effect has
133
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
destroyed the simple dignity which stamps the Pisa pulpit
as the superior work.
Niccola Pisano not only excelled as a sculptor, but was
also the greatest Italian architect of his century; he de-
signed an immense number of buildings, many of them
very important, though not all which Vasari attributes to
him. Among those that have escaped the mischief of the
Renaissance period are a considerable part of Pistoja Cathe-
dral, a small portion of Sta Margharita at Cortona, and Sta
Trinita at Florence. San Antonio at Padua has been attri-
buted to him, but on slender hypothesis. Unfortunately
Pisano's architectural works have been in many cases much
altered and modernised. Though his importance as a re-
viver of the old traditions of beauty in art has been to
some extent exaggerated by Vasari and others, yet to him
is probably due more than to any other man the inception
of the renaissance of the plastic arts which, in years follow-
ing his death, was so fertile in countless works of the most
unrivalled beauty. Both Niccola and his son Giovanni had
many pupils of great artistic power, and these carried the
influence of the Pisani throughout Tuscanyand North Italy
generally, so that the whole art of the succeeding genera-
tion may be said to have owed the greater part of its rapid
development to this one family.
Giovanni Pisano, the son of Niccola, was born about the
year 1250, and, as an architect and sculptor, was but little
inferior to his father. He however, inherited little of his
father's admiration for Classic art, but a great deal of his
romanticism, which, in all likelihood, was fostered by his
intercourse with the sculptors of the north. Together with
Arnolfo del Cambio and other pupils, he developed and
extended into other parts of Italy the “new-birth” of
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THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
sculpture, which in the main was due to the extraordinary
talent of this distinguished artist. Having spent the first
half of his life at home as pupil and co-worker with Niccola,
Giovanni, between 1270 and 1274, was summoned to
Naples, where he worked for Charles of Anjou on the Castel
Nuovo. One of his earliest independent works was the
Campo Santo at Pisa, finished about 1283 ; along with these
he executed various pieces of sculpture over the main door
and inside the cloister of that great structure.
The richest in design of all Giovanni's works is the
marble high altar and reredos in Arezzo Cathedral (C. 1268),
adorned both in front and back with a multitude of figures
and reliefs mostly illustrative of the lives of St Gregory
and St Donatus, whose remains are enshrined there. The
actual execution of this altar-piece (of which some descrip-
tion will be found on page 265) was probably wholly the
work of his pupils.
In 1290 Giovanni was appointed architect or capo mastro
of the new cathedral at Siena, in which office he succeeded
Lorenzo Maitani, who went to Orvieto to build the less
ambitious but, as far as its western façade is concerned,
equally splendid Duomo which had recently been founded
there. The design of the west front of Orvieto Cathedral
has been attributed to Giovanni, but the probability is that
he only carried out Maitani's designs. Vasari tells us that
Giovanni and other pupils of Niccola Pisano also executea
those delicate, minute bas-reliefs on the pilasters between
the three doorways of the front, but his assertion is un-
supported by any documentary evidence.
At Perugia, Giovanni built San Domenico (c. 1314), but
this church has been so modernised internally that little of
the original structure remains beyond the transept, the
135
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
square-ended choir with its enormous pointed window, and
its lateral chapels. The northern transept retains one of
Giovanni's most beautiful conceptions, the tomb of Bene-
dict XI., in which the sleeping figure of the Pontiff is
guarded by angels who draw aside a curtain-a very favour-
ite feature in monuments of this description.
Above is a sculptured plinth, supporting canopied figures
of the Madonna and other saints. The whole composition
is framed by a high cusped arch beneath a gable, supported
on twisted columns, which are enrichediwith glass mosaicin
the style of the Cosmati. The general design of this monu-
ment features that of the earlier tomb of the Cardinal de
Braye in the Church of San Domenico at Orvieto, the work
of Giovanni's fellow-pupil, Arnolfo del Cambio.
Of Giovanni's most beautiful architectural works we
have an illustration in the little Chapel of Sta Maria della
Spina, on the banks of the Arno at Pisa, illustrated on
page 20.
The influence of his father, Niccola, is seen strongly in
all Giovanni's works, but especially in that pulpit of San
Andrea at Pistoja, which must be assigned to the very early
part of the fourteenth century.
During the fourteenth century, Florence and the neigh-
bouring cities were the chief centres of Italian sculpture,
and there numerous sculptors of necessarily increasing
architects both lived and worked, till in the fifteenth
century Florence had become the artistic capital of the
world, and reached a pitch of artistic wealth and perfection
which Athens alone in its most halcyon days could have
rivalled. The similarity between the plastic arts of Athens
in the fifth or fourth centuries before Christ, and of
Florence in the fifteenth, is not one of analogy only.
va
136
• THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
Though free from any touch of copyism, the works of such
men as Donatello, Luca della Robbia, and Vittore Pisanello,
strongly recall in many points the sculpture of ancient
Greece, and suggest that, if a sculptor of the later Phidian
school had been surrounded by the same types of face and
costume as those among which the Italians lived, he would
have produced plastic works closely resembling those of the
great Florentine masters.
Very beautiful sepulchral effigies in low relief were pro-
duced in many parts of Italy, especially at Florence. I
would refer more particularly to the tomb of Lorenzo
Acciaioli in the Certosa near that city, as a fine example of
about 1400, which has been absurdly attributed to Dona-
tello, while in the tombs of the Popes in San Domenico at
Perugia, San Francesco at Viterbo, Arezzo Cathedral, the
Baptisteryat Florence, and San Giovanni Laterano at Rome,
the progress of sculpture down to the dawn of the Renais-
sance may be admirably studied.
For the great sculptors of Tuscany I must refer the reader
to Mr Perkins' exhaustive volume, and to the numerous
biographies of such men as the Pisani, Arnolfo del Cambio,
Orcagna, Ghiberti, Donatello, Rossellini, Benedetto da
Maiano, and finally Michael Angelo, who raised the sculp-
ture of the modern world to the highest pitch of magnifi-
cence, and at the same time sowed the seeds of its rapidly
approaching decline.
But as time went on, a growing love of luxury and dis-
play, which was the curse of the age, was reflected in the
plastic decoration of churches. The old religious spirit had
died out, and was succeeded by unbelief, or by a revived
paganism. The youthful vigour of Christian faith vivified
for a time the dry bones of expiring Classic art, and now
137
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the decay of this same belief brought with it the destruc-
tion of all that was most valuable in mediæval sculpture.
The art, like the others, became the bond-servant of the
rich, and ceased to be the natural expression of a whole
people. That great technical skill continued to exist in Italy
cannot be denied, but the vivifying spirit was dead, or at
least a dull scholasticism or a riotous extravagance of design
became the leading characteristics.
Of the Florentine churches the one most closely associ-
ated with the history of the city is that of Or San Michele.
This church, whose leading architectural features are illus-
trated elsewhere in these pages, is remarkable for the statues
by Ghiberti, Donatello, Verrocchio, and others, which oc-
cupy niches on the exterior, but none are very remarkable
except Donatello's St George, which, by the way, is much too
good for the niche in which it is enshrined. In an especial
manner, Or San Michele was considered to belong to the
merchants and artisans, who emulated one another in their
desire for its adornment, and yearly, on the festas of their
patron saints, the guilds used to attend and lay their offer-
ings in the church.
The immediate neighbourhood of the church was held
to be a sort of sacred place, in which no gambling or noisy
occupation was permitted. Commissions were given by the
guilds to the first artists of the time for statues to fill the
niches. Lorenzo Ghiberti had just completed his famous
gates to the Baptistery of the Duomo, when he was directed
to execute a bronze statue of St John the Baptist for the
Foreign Wool Merchants, and which was to be 41 braccias
high. If he failed, he was to bear the loss; if he succeeded
in casting the statue, he was to receive the price the Consuls
fixed, when negotiating with another master. Accordingly
138
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
Lorenzo commenced the work, nor did he leave it until its
entire completion. The figure has been, and still is, highly
commended ; the name of the artist is engraved on the
mantle. This statue of the Baptist was placed in a tabernacle
designed for it in 1414, and in the head, in an arm which
seems to be of the living flesh rather than of bronze, in the
hands, and in the attitude, may be seen a commencement
Lorenzo was the first who began to emulate the works
of antiquity, of which he was a zealous student, as all must
be who would attain perfection in their art. In the front and
upper part of the tabernacle enclosing the figure, the master
made an attempt in mosaic, placing there the half-length
figure of a prophet. This mosaic, however, cannot now be
discerned.
The Guild of Hosiers were divided among themselves
as to whether Ghiberti or Donatello should obtain the order
for the figure of St Thomas, and, as is not unusual in com-
petitions, a third person carried off the prize, viz., sculptor
Andrea Verrochio, who had given evidence of his skill in
the monument to Giovanni and Piero Medici. When com-
pleted, so much praise was bestowed upon the group of St
Thomas and Our Saviour, that Verrochio believed it was
impossible for him to produce a better work, and accord-
ingly abandoned sculpture for painting.
This group stands within a Renaissance niche with twist-
ed Ionic columns supporting an entablature from which
rises a cusped arch ; on either side this is a tall composite
and St John Baptist by Ghiberti, are in Gothic tabernacles.
The other figures are St James the Great, by Nanni di
S ar
139
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
e
Baccio; the Madonna, by Simon of Fiesole ; St John the
Evangelist, by Baccio da Montelupo; St Philip and four
saints, by Nanni di Baccio ; St George, by Donatello; St
Matthew, by Ghiberti ; St Stephen, also by Ghiberti ; and
St Eligius or Eloy, by Nanni di Baccio.
• The statue of St James is by Banco, who was much em-
ployed on sculpture about the church, and who devoted
himself to this noble art, not from necessity, but from a
true love to the calling.
The group of the Virgin and Child is attributed to
Simon da Fiesole, who is said to have been a brother of
Donatello. This statue was injured by a Jew in 1493, and,
in consequence, was removed within the church. After a
time it was set up in a niche, but miraculous powers being
ascribed to it, it was again brought back to the church.
In his statue of St John the Evangelist, Baccio da Monte-
lupo has departed from the usual type of the saint. He had
not given much evidence of his skill when he received the
commission for this statue, and several other masters pre-
pared models in emulation, but on the completion of the
work he was recognised as a true artist. The statue, how-
ever, is hardly equal in merit to some of its contemporaries.
It was the gift of the Silk Mercers, whose arms (the gate
of Sta Maria) appear above ; all these are under Gothic
tabernacles.
The statues of St Philip and of four saints grouped
under one tabernacle are by Banco, and their story has been
fully narrated in Vasari's Lives of the most excellent Painters,
Sculptors and Architects.*
* Vasari, a Florentine artist of the sixteenth century, eminent as a
painter, architect, and author, was born in 1512, or, as others aver, in
1514 at Arezzo, and at first studied painting on glass under the cele-
140
THE ARTS SUBSIDIARY TO ARCHITECTURE
The relief under the group is also by Nanni, and repre-
sents a sculptor working at a statue of a child, and a mason
building a wall. The four saints in the group are Claudius,
Nicostratus, Sinfronius and Castorius, four sculptors, who
were martyred in the time of Diocletian. :.
Donatello's St George, contributed by the Guild of
Armourers, is by some critics considered to be his chef-
dæuvre, and it has formed the subject of many discourses,
Mr J. Addington Symonds, who lovingly studied the Re-
naissance, dwelling upon it in his work on that period. St
Matthew and St Stephen, by Ghiberti, and St Eligius, by
Nanni da Banco, complete the series.
These statues in niches at Or San Michele are an Italian
imitation of the northern custom. The statues themselves
are fine, but the niches are far too large and ungainly. In
the attempt to avoid the cramped niches of our later archi-
tects, the Italians fell into as great a fault on the opposite
side. The early French arrangement, in which the figure
stands under a delicate canopy, but not squeezed into a
niche, is always the best in every way.
brated William-erroneously styled-of Marseilles. This branch of the
art he afterwards abandoned for a higher department, and became the
pupil of Andrea del Sarto and subsequently of Michael Angelo, while
his progress in classical learning was so far from being neglected, that he
is said to have been able to repeat the entire Æneid before he was ten
years old. Those munificent patrons of art, the Medici family, gave him
great encouragement, and the literary work by which he is principally
known as an author, The Lives of the most excellent Painters, sculptors,
Architects, etc. (Florence, 1550, 2 vols. 4to), was written at the instiga-
tion and under the auspices of the cardinal of that name. A second edition
of this treatise appeared in 1563 (3 vols. 4to), a third in 1571, and a fourth
at Rome as late as 1758, in 7 vols. An English translation, first published
about 1850 by Bohn, is still regarded as an authority.
141
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
CHAPTER IV
The RomanesqueGenoa : Pisa : Lucca : Pistoja
DY the end of the eleventh century Romanesque archi-
Dtecture in most (or all) of the countries where it pre-
vailed, showedits progression rather in perfecting the work-
manship, refining the details, and in generating suitable
systems of ornamentation, than in developing any new
principles. The efforts of the Romanesque builders, from
the beginning of the twelfth century, to refine and perfect
their art, can only be appreciated by those who apply to the
works of that period the closest and most careful examina-
tion. This breathless race after refinement evinced itself
alike in each country where the Romanesquestyle prevailed,
but it is natural that the forms of ornamentation followed
should in a greater or less degree assume in each its own
provincial character, and as this ceaseless reaching forward
after perfection was the ripening for, and the prelude to,
the great transition so soon to follow, it was equally natural
that this change, though on a broad view of the case one,
should, on a narrower view, appear to be multiform ; that
of each country being influenced by the varieties of its own
particular form of Romanesque. The whole movement was,
in all probability, profoundly affected and stimulated by the
bringing the nations of the Western Church together, and
opening out to them the arts of that of the East, as well as
those of their infidel enemies by means of the Crusades;
yet while this tended to keep the art progress of the West-
ern nations from wandering too widely apart, it did not
prevent the existence of local and national varieties. The
142
THE ROMANESQUE
one greatest element of all in the transition in whatever
country it was being worked out, was, of course, the
Pointed arch. This was called for by more causes than one.
1. The tendency of the later Romanesque was to in-
creased height; but while the columns could be elongated,
the round arch was incapable of extension. An arch,
therefore, was craved of elastic proportions.
2. In vaulting any space but an absolute square with
groining, the semicircular vault could hardly be used
both ways, or either; one would be higher than the
other, or anyhow their intersecting line would not be
in a true plane for that purpose ; then an arch of variable
proportions was needed.
3. In arching over great spans, such as naves of
churches, or in using arches for the support of great
weight, as those under central towers, the round arch
was found to be weak and to produce undue outward
pressure; and from this cause an arch of increased height
was demanded. The architects knew the form of the
Pointed arch. They had met with it in the first proposi-
tion of Euclid ; they had seen or heard of it in the East;
their brethren had used it in Sicily, and themselves in
their intersecting arcading. They saw that it met the
threefold cravings of their art-and they adopted it-
first where most demanded, and eventually from finding
it just what was wanted for the perfecting of their archi-
tecture. The result was magical. It became in the hands
of men, labouring to render their architecture expressive
of the ennobling sentiments of religion, a means of per-
fecting that solemnity which the Romanesque buildings
possess in so wonderful a degree, and of adding the most
exalted sublimity to its hitherto stern and rugged grandeur.
143
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
At first, however, it was limited to the vaulting of large
spans and to arches of large width or carrying great
weight, the round arch remaining long in use för smaller
and less important openings.
The gradual establishment of these new principles at
first in the Early Christian-Roman works had always to
struggle in that country (the fountainhead of Classic)
with strong local influences, and were never able wholly
to assert themselves as they did ultimately north of the
Alps. Transferred for a time to Byzantium, and thence to
Ravenna, they combined with strong original Greek and
Oriental influences. In the former case, the Latin-cross
plan, the basilican arrangement of nave and aisles, wooden
roof and Roman round -edged type of foliage were
followed. In the other, the Greek cross plan, domed
vaults and sharp pointed Greek type of the acanthus
foliage prevailed.
It would be useless as it would be hopeless, within
these limits, to treat of Romanesque in its varied forms,
such as is exhibited in different districts of Italy and of
France, in Germany and in England, and to tell how
each developed itself into the particular form from which
in its own country the great transition became imminent.
Suffice it to say that in each country of Western Europe
the Romanesque style did so develop itself, and that it
did in the early half of the twelfth century ripen for a
inevitable result.
first which can be called a genuine Romanesque style; all
the great features of the building internally, at least,
begin to be designed according to Romanesque principles,
144
THE ROMANESQUE: GENOA
and yet even within there is something which shows that
they are not fully carried out. And without, they are still
more imperfect; their flat, unvaried outlines—too often
reproduced in the Pointed Gothic of Italy—have not that
picturesque grouping which is so pleasing a feature in
their Rhenish compeers. Still, even as to the exterior,
architecture is greatly indebted to the Lombard architects;
they at once grasped the true manner of decorating plain
surfaces, and they gave us that germ of all that is so grand
and beautiful in Italian church architecture, the Campanile.
Distinctively Lombard buildings--I mean those in which
we perceive no deliberate return to Roman and Ravennese
models presenta Romanesque pure but not perfect, awon-
derful advance on preceding structures, but still affording
a fine field for the genius of development to work upon.
In Genoa and its neighbourhood the older churches
are purely and simply basilican in their plans, the naves
having the usual basilican arcade of round arches resting
on cylindrical columns, with classical capitals and bases,
and the choir, which is usually short, terminates in a
simple semicircular apse.
The Cathedral of Genoa, dedicated to St Lawrence and
built between 989 and 1199, was enlarged and repaired
in 1260, but the choir and transepts were sadly altered
internally during the early part of the sixteenth century.
The nave,* the most beautiful and interesting part of the
interior, is of the Romanesque period, and has nine arches
on either side, which are Pointed, and rest on cylindrical
columns, with acanthus-leaf capitals and bases such as
may be seen in San Donato; only at each angle of the
plinth are figures, such as snakes' or sheep's heads. Above
* Illustrated on p. 156.
145
IO
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
this arcade is a triforium, open to the aisles, which are
consequently of great height. I suspect this arrangement
to be original--for there is no evidence of any vaulting
at the level of the naye archesand used by builders who
were ignorant of the proper use of triforia. There are as
many arches in this upper arcade as there are in the lower,
resting upon short pillars alternately circular and oblong,
with a circular shaft applied to its east and west ends.
The capitals here affect the à crochet rather than the
Corinthian form, and the arches are round. Over this
triforium arcade is an unrelieved portion of walling, and
then comes the clerestory, lighted in the first five bays
by simple round-headed windows, glazed in small circular
quarries, as are the windows at the west end of the aisles
and those lighting the aisles themselves, which are placed
very high up in the walls. The four remaining windows
of the clerestory are rather smaller, and between each the
wall is pierced with a circle. The material is black and
white marble in horizontal bands, but the pillars of the
lower arcade are of black marble, with just a band of white
at the point where they spring from the bases. It is im-
possible to extol too highly the magnificent and sumptuous
ensemble produced by the natural polychromy in the nave
of Genoa Cathedral. I will mention one instance of it which
particularly struck me. I refer to one or two pillars at
the western end of the nave of this church.* These are
* These magnificent clusters of shafts in Genoa Cathedral are used
to support three arches which span the church transversely and carry
a deep western gallery. As they are somewhat lower than the simple
cylindrical columns of the nave arcade, the western half of the arch
which is brought down upon them is considerably longer than the
eastern half, whereby a curiously stilted, but by no means unpleasing,
effect is arrived at.
146
THE ROMANESQUE: GENOA
of later date than the church in general, and are so
beautiful in their detail that, without any wish to dis-
parage Italian architecture, my first involuntary impres-
sion was that they must have been designed by a French
artist, of which I am the more convinced by minute in-
spection of the photographs of them in my possession.
The artist, however, made himself perfect master of the
Italian material. The pillars consist of an octagonal
nucleus of plain stone, nearly concealed by twenty-four
detached shafts which surround it. These are most beauti-
fully arranged, both in position, size, and colour. Those
occupying the four cardinal faces (1 foot 5 inches in dia-
meter) are of a rich mottle of crimson, green and white.
Those on the diagonal faces (11 inches in diameter) are
alternately of black and white; and between these and the
great shafts are, in each interval, two smaller shafts 6 inches
and 43 inches in diameter), also black and white, but the
colours counter-changed, so that on two sides we have three
white and two black, and on the others three black and
two white. The richly carved capitals are white, the abacus
with cresting of dark marble; the bases (supported by
stiff foliage) are of a mottle of black and crimson on a
light coloured plinth. The superincumbent arches are of
alternate voussoirs of light and dark marble. The whole
struck me as one of the most delightful combinations I
had ever seen, and much the same may be said of the
· noble western portals of the same church, evidently de-
signed by the same hand. The details are for the most
part purely French, as is the general design, but the use
of polychromatic materials is carried to its fullest extent,
as also is the use of that beautiful Italian feature, the
twisted column and moulding. In one of these portals, of
147
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
which I took special memoranda, the larger detached shafts
are alternately of green and dark mottled marbles, the
smaller ones of a red mottle and black. They are placed
against a flat splayed jamb of great depth, which is formed
of alternate courses of dark and light marble, the light
courses being inlaid with small pattern-work. The bases
are white, with the beautiful French enrichment of sup-
porting leaves; the plinth is in courses of various colours,
inlaid, dark upon white, and white upon dark. The arch
stones are alternately dark and white, but in some of the
orders the individual bowtells are cut out, and black or
white inserted ; counterchanging in each course—an ex-
aggeration, I presume, of the principle, as it infringes a
little upon the construction.
I have said that this glorious nave of Genoa Cathedral
was in progress between the latter part of the tenth and
the close of the twelfth centuries, but an inscription, cut
horizontally under the triforia, states that the north and
south sides were respectively restored in 1307 and 1312.
I should imagine that both arcades belong to the earlier
period, when Pointed arches were used, but when their
strength and beauty were as yet not fully appreciated.
These inscriptions run as follows : On the north side :
*“MCCCVII Pastonus de Nigro et Nicolaus de Goano
fecerunt renovari hoc opus de deceno legatorum.”
On the south:
* “MCCCXII Filippå d. Nigro e. Nicolau. d. Goano re-
paratores huj. ecclie fecert renovai hoc op d. dceno legatorum.
Janprīceps Trojan, astrologia perit. navigãdo ad habitādū locū
querēs sane drabile e. securū Januā jam fūdată a Jano rege Italie
p. nepote hoc venit et eā cernens mare et mõtibtutissimā āpliavit
noie e. posse.”
148

GENOA : CENTRAL WESTERN DOORWAY OF THE CATHEDRAL.
THE ROMANESQUE: GENOA
The exterior of the Cathedral at Genoa abounds in ex-
quisite detail, the windows in the Romanesque portions
being particularly deserving of study. Their voussoirs ex-
ternally are composed of black and white marble alter-
nately, a treatment universally applied in horizontal bands
to the façades of all the smaller churches in Genoa and its
territory—a fashion which, when the work was new, must
have been somewhat harsh, but which under the mellow-
ing influence of time, becomes merely characteristic of an
eccentric national taste. *
Some writers say that this mode of construction was
confined to public buildings and to those erected by the
commune. The four great families of Doria, Grimaldi,
Spinola, and Fieschi, alone among the patricians had the
right of employing it, but I have not been able to discover
any authority for this statement. That the Doria family
possessed this right is amply proved by the church now
under consideration ; the case of the Fieschi is illustrated
in their church at San Salvatore near Chiavari.
In Tuscany all the chief cathedrals and religious houses
were raised in times when the social body was rent by
civil war or local revolution ; and in this remarkable fact
we have an implied evidence how great must have been
the ascendency of religious feeling amidst circumstances
so unfavourable to that concentrating of capacities and
means requisite for great monumental works!
From the time of Charlemagne until the fall of the
Holy Roman Empire in 1803 with Francis II., 450 years
* The white bands have incised on them long legends commemora-
tive of the founders or benefactors of the Church, or for sepulchral
inscriptions, a fashion prevalent in Italy, but perhaps nowhere more so
than in Genoa and its vicinity.
149
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
elapsed, and during all that time Germany and Italy had
been practically one country under one sovereign. Hence
evidence of their union meets us at every turn in the
early churches of the two countries, and indeed in some
of the Gothic ones. At Pavia and in Bergamo we are
in presence of the same art as at Mainz, Coblenz and
Cologne.
The minor changes and varieties in the round-arched
buildings of Germany are too many and various to be
alluded to more than cursorily in this place, though not
so numerous as they were in various parts of France. In
those days France was formed by a number of provinces,
each practically distinct from the other, and consequently
we see as many styles as there are provinces. The whole of
the south of France is fairly uniform, but when we come
to compare Normandy with Poitou, or either with Aqui-
taine, Alsace, the Ile de France, Champagne or Burgundy,
we shall find, in fact, that one thing common to all was
the round arch, and a perfect freedom of developing what-
ever was required for convenience for good construction
or for the demands of a different climate. How this last
requirement affected art is a matter which from exigencies
of space I am constrained from entering upon here. But
when we come to consider that in the south of Europe a
flat roof is the best covering, whilst in the north a steep
one is a necessity; and that in the south a very small
window is requisite, whilst in the north it can hardly be
too large; we have two particulars out of many, which
alone would account for a great change in style. The
builders of those days proceeded to modify and develop
in a mode which was everywhere founded on common-
sense, and varied, therefore, in its developments in every
150
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
country. This, indeed, is one of the great accomplish-
ments in the architects of the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries.
In Italy, one of the completest of the round-arched
buildings is the Cathedral at Pisa. If anywhere Roman in-
fluence should be felt, one would have supposed it would
be there. But the Pisans, like their contemporaries, the
men of Genoa, of Amalfi, and of Venice, were resolute
adventurers who went far afield, and in 1050 they made
an expedition to Sicily.
The local church of Pisa is said by tradition to have been
founded by St Peter when he visited these shores after his
first sojourn in Rome, and on the site where now stands
about three miles from the city the fine old basilica of
San Pietro in Grado, built in the ninth century. That
apostle is said to have celebrated Mass at an altar raised
for his use-on which spot an oratory was dedicated to
him by his successor, St Clement,
The first bishop of this see, according to the same tradi-
tion, was St Perinus, who had been baptized and conse-
crated for that office by St Peter ; but history preserves
no name of any prelate undoubtedly appointed to the
Pisan diocese, earlier than Gaudentius, a bishop who sat
in the council held at Rome by Pope Melchiades, A.D.
313.
The eleventh century—especially the period between
1003 and 1089_was the heroic age of Pisa ; though, up
to the close of the century subsequent, we have no reliable
contemporary records of her annals, save a barbaric Latin
poem, or rather metrical chronicle, edited by Muratori.
The first great success won by the Pisan fleet in the wars
gallantly carried on by the rising Republic of this city
151
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
res
on
ice
СО.
against the Saracens, was in an encounter at the mouth of
the Tiber, where the Pisans captured eighteen Moorish
galleys laden with spoil, the fruit of maraudings in the
Roman provinces, A.D. 1003.
In the year 1051, Sardinia and Corsica were finally
rescued from Saracenic invaders, who had more than once
descended upon and long occupied these islands. But the
greatest victory of the Pisan naval power was achieved
twelve years later in the harbour of Palermo and also
against the Saracens, after this Tuscan state had leagued
with the Normans for the deliverance of Sicily from the
common foe. Then were the spolia opima awarded to the
combatants from the city on the Arno : who carried away
the chains of the Palermitan harbour, and six vessels laden
with objects of Oriental manufacture-silks, woven stuffs,
spices, wrought gold, and what not. It was on finding her-
self thus enriched through conquest, that Pisa determined
to dedicate her treasures to the noblest purpose, and now
was it “decreed with unanimous consent (as a chronicler
informs us) that a splendid temple should be erected,
worthy of the Divine Majesty, and also such as to command
universal admiration.”
The new Cathedral was founded above a primitive
church, Sta Reparata, which had been built, in far remote
antiquity, over the ruins of either thermæ or a palace
ascribed to the Emperor Hadrian. The works were com-
menced, as supposed, in 1063, and brought to completion
either in 1092 or 1100. Certain it is that in 1118 the church
was solemnly consecrated by Pope Gelasius II., then a
fugitive from Rome. Local tradition has assumed that the
principal architect was one Busketus (or Boschetto), whom
some suppose, but without sufficient grounds, to have been
152
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
a Greek, and who is thus mentioned in a quaint epigraph
on the façade :-
“At sua Busketum splendida templa probant,
Non habet exemplum niveo de marmore templum
Quod fit Busketi prorsus ut ingenio."
But another inscription near the chief portal assigns to
one Rainaldus the credit of at least a considerable share in
the works ; and a passage is cited by a Pisan writer from
the registers of this Cathedral conveying a statement that
overthrows all hitherto-received notions on the subject :
namely, that one Ildebrando del Giudice was directing
architect, under whom Boschetto and four others were
employed in subordinate capacities.*
Boschetto built the Pisans a magnificent church cer-
tainly. But it is neither Roman nor Italian. It has the long
ranges of columns of the basilica, but it has the Eastern
dome; and in every detail of the work it is the Greek
whose hand we see, and Byzantine architecture, not Roman-
esque, with a soupçon of that Arabian art which is so notice-
able in the more southern part of Italy. And it was under
the shadow of its arcaded walls that the greatest architect
of the thirteenth century was born and educated in his art-
I refer to Niccola Pisano.
The style usually called “ Lombardic” is more correctly
* “Fu l'anno 1080, Ildebrando del Giudice, Uberto, Leone,
Signoretto, Alliato, e Buschetto du Dulichio, che fu architetto ; il. capo
di detti ſu Ildebrando, é gli alteri furono ministri e uffiziali dell opera."
-Pisa Illustrata. v.i.c. 3 and 3.
In his Storia dell'Architettura Italiana, Ricci assumes an earlier
origin than do other critics for this architecture, inferring from analogies
with the façades of two other conspicuous churches in Pisa, San Michele
in Borgo and San Pietro d'Arno, both known to have been finished in
1018.
153
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
found all over Lombardy, in the campaniles and belfry-
towers of Rome and in the Rhenish churches. That it had
its origin in the Republic of Pisa there is no doubt, and
the Pisans are justly proud of having been the originators
of it. As exact dates are important in these matters, I have
appended a list of the most important examples of Pisan
buildings which should be taken in conjunction with those
of Lucca. Those of the latter city having been compara-
tively less altered and tampered with by the Classical Re-
vivalists, are more interesting than those of Pisa itself.*
The plan of Pisa Cathedral corresponds to that of Roman
basilicas, except in features which are indeed important ;
the Latin-cross form, the prolongation of the apse into a
spacious choir, the elliptical cupola resting on an octagonal
drum, and the triforium, which is boldly defined and re-
markably graceful. This architecture is among earliest ex-
amples of the improvement upon the Romanesque; and
it seems that the further we go from Rome the more are
freedom and originality apparent in developments from
types which Rome herself created. Criticism might object
to much profuse decoration that in no way enters into the
constructive plan of this church. No fewer than four hun-
dred and fifty columns, many with fantastic sculptures in
their capitals, are to be numbered in the entire edifice;
fifty-eight on the façade alone ; and it is conjectured that
* A.D. 1067-1118. The Duomo.
, 1077 (c). San Frediano.
, 1108-78, 1278-1465. The Campo Santo.
» 1115. San Paolo a Ripa.
1153, 1278-1350 (c). The Baptistery.
1174-1350. The Leaning Tower.
» 1253. Sta Caterina.
„ 1210-1304. San Michele in Borgo.
1230-1323. Sta Maria della Spina.
154
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
some of these accessorial sculptures may be symbols of
Oriental worship, or rather idolatries practised in the Julia
Pisana of Roman colonisation, or in the islands of Elba,
Sardinia and Giglio, whence many of these columns were
brought. A porphyry shaft from Majorca is a trophy of
conquest in that island, whence it was transferred together
with two others, also of porphyry, which were consigned
to the Florentines in reward for their armed co-operation,
and are now to be seen placed beside the chief entrance of
the Baptistery at Florence. To this shaft on the façade of
Pisa Cathedral was formerly attached the superstition
(whether it is extinct now, I am not in a position to say),
that whoever looked upon it should, during that day, be
secured against the danger of being betrayed (non poteva
essere tradito), a thoroughly mediæval Italian idea.
The recognisable signs of old age are the glory of a
monumental building; and we see with interest the traces
of development from the almost barbaric to the highest
attainments in sacred art, amidst the mass of details on the
exterior of the Duomo at Pisa. Five marble statues at the
angles of the façades display the characteristics of the
deeply fallen school anterior to the revival, of which Pisa
was the centre, in the thirteenth century. A Virgin and
Child, at the gable summit, sculptures somewhat superior,
were probably substituted for another statue of the Ma-
donna, of earlier date, that stood in a tabernacle, as is re-
presented in a view of this Cathedral, in the background of
a fresco, by Antonio Veneziano, among those that adorn
the Campo Santo. The genuine revival of sculpture is re-
presented among the art-works in the Duomo, by the
statuettes from the unfortunately destroyed pulpit, a
masterpiece of Giovanni Pisano ; while the later Renais-
155
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
sance is before us in the beautiful reliefs of the bronze por-
tals—the history and mystic emblems of the Blessed Virgin,
from designs by Gian. Bologna ; in the paintings by Ghir-
landajo, Beccefumi, and Andrea del Sarto.
The interior of this Duomo at Pisa is distinguished by
an elevation of aim and a grand harmony of effect. Here
we see clearly the early introduction of the acute arch,
striving for ascendency with the semicircular forms which
still prevail. I need not describe what is so well known,
my object being merely to point out the rank due to this
celebrated church in ecclesiastical and in artistic history
as representing the transition between the early Roman-
esque and the later mediæval Italian. But special attention
is claimed by art-work here the first that arrests the eye
as we enter by the great western door—the colossal mosaic
in the semi-dome of the apse of the Saviour enthroned,
severe and solemn in aspect, the hair and beard dark, hold-
ing a book open at the words, “Ego Lux mundi sum,"
and attended by the Blessed Virgin and St John, executed
in 1290 by the well-known Franciscan mosaicist, Jacopo
da Torrita, assisted by Andrea Tafi, Gaddo Gaddi, and
(as the registers show) by Cimabue also ; the entire figure
of the Madonna, however, being by a Pisan artist, Vicino,
of date 1321.
In 1596 there was a destructive fire, in which some of
the Cathedral's most valued ornaments, the pulpit, by
Giovanni Pisano, and the bronze portals covered with re-
liefs by Bonanno of Pisa, and dating from the last two
decades of the twelfth century, were lost.
Fortunately the other bronze doors by the same artist
on the eastern side of the south transept were preserved.
On these is a most curious series of reliefs, with inscrip-
156

PISA CATHEDRAL : INTERIOR, LOOKING EAST.
GENOA CATHEDRAL : INTERIOR, LOOKING EAST,
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
tions in barbaric Latin, representing the Gospel history
from the appearance of the Angel to Zacharias to the
Ascension, also the death of the Virgin, in which scene, as
invariably found in earliest representations of it, not the
bodily assumption of Mary, but the Saviour receiving her
soul in the form of a new-born infant is introduced. On
the highest panels the subjects are Christ enthroned amidst
adoring angels, and Mary also on a throne and attended
by angels, but whose attitude is not that of worship. The
whole composition has analogies with the only other ex-
tant work by Bonanno di Pisa—the bronze doors, executed
in 1186, with forty-two reliefs illustrating both the Old
and New Testament, at Monreale.
After this fire Pisa Cathedral was restored in 1602 at
the expense of 85,000 ducats, but the works were carried
out with such consummate skill and taste, and so closely
approaching the original in spirit, that it needs a keen eye
to detect the difference between the work of the two
periods. The flat-coffered ceiling of the nave (the aisles
are vaulted) was then renewed with profuse gilding and
carving in a style more gorgeous even than the altars
ranged along the aisles of the nave, (where the narrow
windows are filled with stained glass, very brilliant in its
tinctures, but in many places rather harsh and indistinct
in its treatment). Each altar has a reredos composed of
two Corinthian columns supporting an entablature and
pediment. These altar-pieces, erected subsequently to
1500, and mostly from designs attributed to Michael An-
gelo, harmonise admirably with the architecture of the
Cathedral. Between each pair of columns is a picture.
There was formerly a magnificent pulpit in the nave of
Pisa Cathedral, executed in Carrara marble by Giovanni di
arrara n
OV
157
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
no
Niccola Pisano. The work was ordered by Borgogno di
Tado in 1302 and completed in 1311.
Being, however, much damaged in the fire of 1596, it was
demolished and portions of it were used in constructing
the present pulpit of 1607. The remaining portions are
now in the Museo Civico at Pisa, and a restoration of this
pulpit in the form of a plaster cast may be seen in the
Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington.
Morrona in his interesting Pisa Illustrata mentions the
disusage of one somewhat fantastic decoration that used to
be displayed at the Festival of the Assumption : a broad
zone of rich draperies studded with gems and intended to
represent the girdle of the Blessed Virgin, which was hung
round the whole circumference of the interior. This adorn-
ment, when at last taken to pieces for the sake of its in-
trinsic value, was estimated as worth 8000 gold florins.
On the whole, Pisa has cause to be thankful that her
Cathedral needed these reparations at an early and pure
epoch of the Renaissance. Though Italian churches have
not suffered mutilation at the hands of religious fanatics,
like those of northern countries, still many a noble Roman-
esque or Pointed Gothic edifice has been ruthlessly dis-
figured by the so-called restoration of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. The zeal of the innovators led them
to destroy, or at least conceal, those portions which they
considered to be the work of a barbarous age, but which
are now, owing to a better appreciation of Christian art,
carefully preserved when re-discovered.
At Pisa, and also at Lucca and Siena, one's taste and
religious susceptibilities are not outraged by any display
of ghastly relics or frightful dolls. The depraved taste, or
rather want of taste, exhibited too frequently-even in this
158
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
1
enlightened age-in Continental churches, is most re-
pellent to artistic feeling. The principle of preserving the
relics of saints cannot be objected to, but when principles,
true in themselves are set forth in exaggeration at the ex-
pense of others, they are apt to develop into monstrosities..
These abnormal productions may be divided into two-
classes—the hideous and the ridiculous. Under the head
of the first will come all representations in wax, or painted
figures of martyrs, which are generally moulded so as to
give due prominence to their wounds ; skeletons dressed
out in tinsel, reclining in glass cases, and other specimens.
of the same kind; while under the head of the second would
be placed those images of Our Lady, which may be more
often met with in Belgian and Swiss churches than else
where. These dolls, for they can come under no other
designation, are provided with tawdry dresses, which, as.
well as their coiffures, are often changed according to the
prevailing fashion !
In countries, such as North Germany and Switzerland,
where the missionary enterprise of the Church should be:
making headway against the tide of Lutheran and Calvin-
istic error, it is scarcely to be supposed that her efforts in
bringing the wanderers into the fold can be assisted by
these and similar representations, while it is to be feared
that in many cases they too often serve as barriers to souls.
which, wearied with groping so long in darkness, are seek-
ing eagerly for the light of Catholic truth, and yet are re-
pelled from entering the Church by the sight of such
excrescences, of whose growth they cannot as yet compre-
hend the cause.
The Italian high altars, even in many churches of the
humblest class, struck me as being singularly deficient in.
CTC
159
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
CA
anything offensive to the eye or taste. They are almost
invariably of the Renaissance period, of costly materials,
and in very many instances from the hand of some archi-
tect and sculptor of eminence.
The gradine supports only the crucifix and the six great
lights. Of course, at festival seasons, or when there is an
Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, a great number of
additional candles is employed, which when lighted up
produce an effect of much magnificence in combination
with the crimson or white and gold hangings with which
it is customary to deck thé sanctuary on such occasions.
their normal aspect. From an architectural point of view
this was fortunate, for when I was in Lombardy and Ven-
etia three years ago, during the latter part of May and the
whole of June, a succession of festas was taking place, and
the columns and other parts of the buildings were swathed
in crimson hangings, so that it was hardly possible to gain
a really correct idea of the natural colouring of the majority
of these noble edifices.
In large cruciform churches, the high altar almost in-
variably stands at the entrance of the short eastern limb,
in which the stalls of the clergy and chorus are arranged,
curtains being drawn across the spaces between it and the
wall on either hand. Sometimes there is a reredos behind
the high altar, sometimes it is surmounted by a baldachino,
as for instance in the great Early Renaissance basilica of
San Spirito at Florence, but, generally speaking, it stands
isolated.
Some details of a more objective nature anent this un-
160
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
rivalled specimen of Tuscan-Romanesque art may be
given before proceeding to other contemporary examples
in the city.
There is very little of the Byzantine element in the plan
and disposition of Pisa Cathedral. It is a five-aisled cruci-
form basilica, and the aisles are provided with an impos-
ing triforium. The choir consists of two large squares
besides the apse; and the transepts are furnished with
aisles--but not double like the nave and eastern limb.
Both the ground plan and the superstructure have the
cruciform clearly marked.
The intersection of the cross is provided with an oval
cupola, and each of the arms has an apse smaller than the
principal one, thus completing a perfectly symmetrical
Latin cross. This form is not so distinctly expressed in
the interior, the transept being marked with a continua-
tion of the outer row of the columns of the nave, which
are continued across the entrance to it in three bays. Thus,
as at Lucca, the cruciform character of the church is lost
internally. The triforium is carried on without interrup-
tion over the transept to the choir, and considerably lessens
the perspective effect. The massive and well-proportioned
arches rest on columns of marble and granite-of which,
out of the seventy columns, fifty-six are of granite and
fourteen marble. These are generally of the Corinthian
or composite order, and according to inscriptions, were
brought from beyond the sea. In one of these inscriptions
Busketus is said to have obtained the columns from the
bottom of the sea : “ pelagi quas traxit ab imo"; but an-
other passage which describes the mechanical contrivances
used in erecting them, “ quod vix potuit per mare ferre
ratis," unmistakably refers to their having arrived in
ens
161
II
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
ships. The heights, as in many other contemporary ex-
amples of such columns, differ, and they are equalised
through a greater or less elongation of the attic base.*
The abacus is broad, the arches of marble, and the walls
and spandrels of the arcades are decorated with black and
white marble incrustations. The aisles are vaulted, but the
nave has a richly coffered ceiling, put up after the fire at
the end of the sixteenth century.
The impression produced by the whole is both solemn
and pleasing, powerful and harmonious. The uninterrupt-
ed ranges of columns and arches, and the use of coloured
marbles, realise an effect scarcely ever attained in any other
ecclesiastical building of this period and style.
The original cupola was destroyed in the fire of 1596,
and rebuilt as we now see it by the Medici, whose arms are
carved upon the two great arches spanning the crossing
transversely, but they apparently used the old materials.
The nave has been lengthened nearly a half: the founda-
tions of the original west front were seen under the
modern pavement by M. Rehalt de Fleury, of Paris, who
published a plan of it; the vaults and clerestory were
added throughout the building. The dates on the mosaic
pictures of the eastern apse, 1290 and 1320, probably in-
dicate the time when this part of the fabric was completed.
Not less rich, symmetrical and well-balanced is the
decorative disposition of the exterior. The ornamental
material throughout is coloured marble. The three rows
of arcades and half-columns mark the side aisles, the tri-
forium, and the clerestory of the central nave, on this
* The pillars of the nave are of marble from Elba and Giglio ; those
of the aisles are the spoils of ancient Greek and Roman buildings
brought by the Pisan galleys.
162
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
most noble development of the basilica. * Columns and
pilasters vary. The panels of the arches are gracefully
ornamented. The upper stages of the apses and the façade
are decorated with arcades resting on insulated columns,
forming, as at Bergamo, Pavia, and in the Rhenish
churches, galleries of charming effect. In the façade
especially, we see a strong endeavour to bring the form
of the Greek temple into harmony with the altered re-
quirements of the Christian church. Whilst Busketus and
Rainaldus succeeded in bringing the heterogeneous Classic
and Christian elements into a concordant union, we may
study in the Churches of San Paolo a Ripa d'Arno in
Pisa, and San Frediano and San Salvatore in Lucca, the
effects of a heavy and vain endeavour to attain a like
result.
The fire at Pisa in 1596 was caused in all probability,
as usual, by the carelessness of plumbers; but there is a
story of much less prosaic character, to the effect that the
calamity was occasioned by spontaneous combustion, the
wind fanning into a flame the leavings of some pigeons
who had effected a burglarious entry into the church
through some broken windows.
This circumstance is playfully alluded to by Richard
Barham in one of his racy, sparkling letters to Mrs
Hughes, widow of Rev. Dr Hughes, Canon-Residentiary
of St Paul's. It is dated 9th November 1844, and may
be read in the Life and Letters of the witty “ Thomas
Ingoldsby," by his son, R. H. D. Barham, but, from its
length, I am reluctantly compelled to forbear quoting it
here.
* In the west front the note struck by the range of arches running
along the base is repeated by four stages of open arcades.
163
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
The Baptistery of Pisa constructed about 1153 by
Dioti Salvi, accords with the general disposition of the
Cathedral, and forms a perfectly original building, in which
we may trace the loftier spirit, the greater correctness,
and the irresistible power of the better-disciplined western
influences. That the dome of the Pisa Baptistery is con-
structed in the same style as Sta Sophia at Constantinople,
San Vitale at Ravenna, or St Mark at Venice, can only be
asserted by writers on art incapable of discerning variety
in unity. There may be a similarity in the four, because
in all these buildings cupolas were used, but the Baptistery
and dome at Pisa are both in arrangement and technical
execution entirely different from any of the above men-
tioned churches. The system of architraves, necessitated
by the use of antique columns, was to be united with
the semicircular dome, and the shapeless and planless
basilica was to be more harmoniously disposed. The
Italians could not but use the scattered fragments of
antique temples. This gave rise to a mode of ornamenta-
tion differing from any other. It was essential to justify
the application of columns to make them appear a con-
structive necessity, and to bring them into æsthetical union
with the whole building. In this the architects of the
re
successful. The gables and pinnacles in the outer decora-
tion of the rotunda, which may appear discordant, were
added in the fourteenth century, and neither Dioti Salvi
nor the Romanesque architects can be credited with them.
The interior measures 100 feet in diameter. The central
part is a circular colonnade, supported by pillars and
columns; the latter having generally trapezoid capitals.
The bases are various, but mostly classical. The surround-
164
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
ing aisle is vaulted, and has plain windows, very small,
with round heads. Above the arcade, twelve arches from
mass-piers open into a triforium, which is vaulted, and of
equal height with the lower aisle, and has also small
windows. Above the upper arcade is the dome, a plain
and, fortunately, unpainted cone.
The ritual arrangements of this Baptistery at Pisa are
very perfect. All round the walls is a raised platform of
three steps. In the very centre is the font, a kind of
octagonal bath, formed by a low wall, 2 feet 7 inches high,
and raised on three steps. This is for adult immersion.
Attached to each oblique side of the octagon, internally,
is a round basin, for the baptism of infants ; these are 17
inches in diameter. The top step surrounding the font is
extended westward, so as to form a small platform, which
is bounded to the west by the back of the altar. The two
lower steps are still further extended westward, as far as
the columns dividing the rotunda from the aisle, and this
platform forms the choir, which is bounded by dwarf walls
and has double stalls returned at the west end, and an altar
facing east, so that the celebrant looks over it towards the
font and the body of the Baptistery. Just outside this choir
on the north side is a modern and worthless ambon; but
on the south side there is a magnificent ambon, the work
of Niccola Pisano in the thirteenth century.
The Italian pulpits of this period are among the most
beautiful relics left to us.
The examples which led up to Pisano's work in the Pisa
Baptistery are of the type of Guido da Como's in San
Bartolommeo at Pistoja, a square erection, supported on
columns resting on beasts, and with its sides covered with
sculpture. Niccola followed the idea but improved upon it.
165
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
se
He made his pulpit hexagonal, and carried it on trefoiled
arches resting on six shafts supported on lions' backs, a
seventh shaft under the centre of the pulpit being sustained
upon a base, composed of crouching figures of men and
animals. In this way he imparted a greater architectural
character to his work than Guido da Como had done ; and
not only is his sculpture superior, but it is the combination
of the two arts that most strikes us, whilst the delicate
taste with which coloured marbles are used to enhance the
beauty of the design, is remarkable.
In the five panels are sculptured groups of the Annun-
ciation, Nativity, Adoration of the Shepherds and of the
Magi, the Presentation in the Temple, and the Last Judg-
ment. In the spandrels of the arches the Evangelists, with
their respective symbols, are introduced, also two kings,
probably David and Solomon, and four prophets. Between
the arches are figures representing, it is generally supposed,
the Four Cardinal Virtues, with St John the Baptist and an
angel bearing a bas-relief of the Crucifixion. Halfway up
the steps by which this glorious pulpit is ascended is a
lectern for the Epistle, and at one angle of the structure
there is another supporting an eagle for the Gospel.
Throughout this work, the sculpture shows a sense of
the value of grouping, and of the natural treatment of
emotions and action, which under Niccola's Italian prede-
cessors had been almost wholly neglected or despised. The
type of figure which most affected him was not beautiful,
and he always greatly exaggerated the size of his heads.
But with any such criticisms as these, one must admit,
nevertheless, that Niccola's work paved the way for all that
was most excellent in the man who came after him. He
learnt something, no doubt, from such a man as Giunta da
166
THE ROMANESQUE: PISA
Pisa, who was flourishing when he was a young man, and
Cimabue and his successors were aiding with equal power
and zeal the work that he was doing.
The date of this pulpit in the Baptistery of Pisa Cathe-
dral is fixed by the following lines engraved under one of
the panels :-
“Anno milleno bis centum bisque triceno
Hoc opus insigne sculpsit Nicola Pisanus
Laudetur digne tam bene docta manus.”
This Baptistery was begun, as I have already said, about
1153, and, although consecrated on its completion a hun-
dred and twenty-five years later, the greater part of what
we see outside is also of the fourteenth century; for there
is little doubt that Niccola's gifted son, Giovanni, with
singular skill, converted the upper part of its hitherto stern
Romanesque exterior into that most picturesque and grace-
ful piece of Gothic work by the addition of a crowd of
traceries, of pinnacles, and niches all round the base of its
sombre dome, with which everybody is familiar. This dome
is covered on the half facing the east with lead, and on that
facing the west with tiles to avoid corrosion from the sea-
winds. Its height from the pavement to the summit is
102 feet.
In Pisa, as in many other Italian cities, all baptisms are
performed in the Baptistery, and there are no fonts in parish
churches. Ancient fonts are usually, as here, octagonal, the
number eight being symbolical of baptism, which completes
the seven days of the old Creation with the eighth day of
the new (1 St Peter, iii. 20-21).
There is a remarkable echo in this Baptistery which con-
verts the notes of a simple scale into the most wonderful
167
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
harmonies, when sung by a single voice, yet by more it
produces dire confusion.
After Pisa itself, Lucca is the best example of the style
of the Pisan Republic, to which the campanili of Rome,
and the well-known apses, with the light open arcades, in
the Rhine churches, also belong. The dates of the Lucca
churches are unusually well preserved by inscriptions in
situ, and by good local histories in which authentic docu-
ments are cited. A chronological table of some of these
churches will therefore be useful as a guide in other places,
the construction and details of which agree with these; I
therefore give a list in a note.*
In none of the minor Italian cities can the architectural
genius of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, south of the
Alps, be more advantageously studied than at Lucca, where
7
* A.D. 1109. San Pietro, rebuilt.
, 1151. San Frediano, the font carved.
, 1167. SS. MM. Vincentius and Anastasius ; the façade :
Undecies centum cum sexagintaque septem post
annos xti tristis capella fuisti.
, 1 195. San Micheletto, rebuilt.
, 1200. Sta Julia, in ruins and rebuilt.
, 1203. San Pietro, the façade added.
, 1204. The facade of the Duomo.
Condidit electi tam pulchras dextra Guidecti
MCCIV.
, 1223. San Frediano, the Campanile.
Magister Ioannes Pisanus fecit A.D. 1223.
, 1233. The open porch in the facade of the Duomo.
Hoc opus cepit fieri ab Elanato et Alderando
operariis.
» 1308-20. The eastern part, all east of nave.
, 1308. The Oratory of La Rosa, with the Madonna of
Giovanni di Pisa.
(The above dates are from Bertini Documenta, etc., tom. iv. p. 347.)
168
THE ROMANESQUE: LUCCA
almost every church presents the features characteristic of
the same local type, to some degree borrowed from the
Pisan, but more fantastic, redundant, and barocco. Along
the basement storey is a series of blind arcades, with half
columns supporting round arches of narrow span; over the
portals ornate reliefs, the Madonna and saints, or other
sacred groups, and figures of animals, sometimes preying
upon others, in projecting brackets : above this basement
storey, two to four stories of open arcades, with pillarets and
similar round arches, the flat surfaces inlaid with coloured
marbles, the capitals and spandrels adorned, in strange pro-
fusion, with symbolic figures, human and bestial, dragons,
griffins, etc. In one church, however, San Frediano, the
glorious mosaic.
The church that pre-eminently represents this Lucchese
style in its grandeur and peculiarities is San Michele,
whose situation in a huge market-place is the most favour-
able, allowing us to walk round the entire structure. The
first impression made by it partakes of astonishment, so
picturesque, rather than architecturally beautiful, so im-
posing, yet so opposed to recognised rules, are its aspect
and details. Four arcade galleries, the two higher con-
siderably narrower than the two below, rise above the
storey of blind arches; over the chief portal are low reliefs
on a horizontal panel, griffins, a female centaur, a double-
tailed siren, and animals in combat ; all the available spaces
above those arcades, on capital, cornice, spandrel, are oc-
cupied by similar dream-like creatures and sculptured and
inlaid work; on the apex of the gable summit stands
a quaint ponderous marble colossus of St Michael, trans-
fixing the dragon, with bronze wings and gold-bordered
169
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
vestments; and at the lower angles are two angels stand-
ing in Gothic canopies, their scale smaller, but both alike
specimens of rude mediæval style. The flanks of the entire
building, and the apse, are divided into two stories of ar-
cades, the lower closed, the upper open, and with columns
supporting arches, as on the façade, though more simple
and classically designed, and therefore to be referred to a
later period, that façade itself being assigned to either the
end of the eleventh or the beginning of the twelfth cen-
tury-with more reason, it seems, to the latter date. The
interior is also chaste and simple in design ; its Corinthian
colonnades supporting round arches; no redundant deco-
ration, and the prevailing tone solemn.
The choir of San Michele was founded in 704 by Luit-
prandus, but there is nothing visible of that period, for the
church was almost entirely rebuilt in the twelfth century.
The western façade, far too ardently “restored,” rises
high above the low gabled roof of the nave, as is common
in Italy, and the tower which rises over the south transept
is a noble example of the Lucchese type, without, however,
the cresting of forked battlements. As San Michele stands
in the principal Piazza of the town, good views may be had
of it from most points, the best and most comprehensive
being obtainable from the south-west corner.
San Michele is one of the few churches in Lucca having
the cruciform plan—the others being the Duomo, Sta
Maria Foris portam, and San Giovanni. The last-named
I much regret not having been able to view internally,
since it was closed for repairs. The other churches, among
them San Alessandro, San Salvatore, San Cristoforo, and
San Frediano, are simple basilicas, with long, unbroken
ranges of columns, no distinct chancel, and a semicircular
170
THE ROMANESQUE : LUCCA
me
apse, which in some cases is the same height as the nave,
thus producing, as in the case of San Frediano, a remark-
ably impressive effect. In fact, Lucca swarms with these
churches, which have such a very strong family likeness
that a recapitulation of their principal features and details
would be tautological and wearisome.
The city of Lucca belonged to the Republic of Pisa at
the time that most of the churches were built or rebuilt,
and as the place has always been poor, when compared with
Florence and Pisa, the buildings are, happily, in a more
genuine state, though considerably tampered with in
Cinquecento days, particularly as regards the roofs of the
churches, which have in too many cases been altered from
low-gabled raftered ones to feeble imitations of Roman-
esque vaulting.
Several of the Lucca churches were founded at an earlier
period, and travellers (here, as elsewhere) are commonly
misled by their hand-books into the notion that the exist-
ing buildings belong to the time of their foundation, which
is but rarely the case ; on the contrary, there is generally
just enough to show that the existing structure belongs
almost entirely to a much more subsequent period.
The Cathedral of San Martino was founded in 1060, and
originally built in two years, when the founder became
Pope Alexander II., but of this original structure there is
nothing visible. The very fine west front, with its tiers of
arcades in the Pisan style rising above a loggia running the
whole width of the church, and flanked to the south by
one of those tall, square, fork-battlemented towers which
are prevalent in Lucca and its vicinity, was built in 1204-
1233, as dated by contemporary inscriptions on the build-
ing itself. The sculptures over the doorways are of that
Oni
171
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
period, as is the labyrinth engraved on the south side. The
north side of the Cathedral belongs to the fourteenth cen-
tury, and is a fine example of the Italian Gothic of that
period. In the interior the piers and arches belong to the
same period as the façade ; the triforium, clerestory and
vaulting are all of the fourteenth century. The apse, viewed
externally, is very fine, with its detached colonnettes and
horizontal cornices, but this part is by no means so early
as it looks. In Lucca, both the horizontal cornice and the
open arcade are used in apses, and both seem to be con-
temporaneous, though one is usually considered to belong
to the earlier Lombard style and the other to the Pisan
style, copied in the great basilicas which extend along the
Rhine from Neuss to Speyer. In Lucca the construction
does not bear out this difference. *
Among the most interesting of minor cities in Central
Italy is Pistoja, which possesses great wealth of sacred
monuments, for the most part well preserved, and of
various mediæval periods.
An hour's ride by rail separates Pistoja from Florence,
the line passing along the beautiful Val d'Arno with all
its little villages and romantic villas, as redolent of historic
memories as are of perfume the thick groves of myrtle
and orange from above which, guarded by the tall solemn
cypress, the white walls peep; past Prato with its traditions
religious and artistic, with its charming little Duomo
built of native materials, into which the marmo verde de
Prato (a deep, almost black, green) so largely enters, an-
other of these pleasant, but little-visited spots, now con-
* Lucca Cathedral belongs for the most part to the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries; it is therefore described more fully in the chapter
devoted to the Gothic.
172
THE ROMANESQUE: PISTOJA
for punemirer
Eh onihend
nected with Florence by a tramcar, which modestly repose
under the walls of an all-absorbing capital.
The scenery around Pistoja is distinguished by an air of
lovely and sheltered repose ; its battlements, walls, towers
and cupolas rise boldly defined against the background of
neighbouring Apennines, and when lit by the rays of a
setting sun, whilst purple evening tints rest on these moun-
tains, the scene is one of the finest and most fascinating
among those that combine architecture and landscape in
Italy.
To the ecclesiologist, to the student and admirer of early
Italian art, and for him who travels for pure sentiment, it
would be difficult to recommend a more delightful spot
than Pistoja. Although only a quiet humdrum town, like
many others the traveller encounters in his journeythrough
Italy, there was a time when Pistoja played an active poli-
tical part, when the historic quarrels of the Guelphs and
Ghibellines, and the family feuds that sprang out of it, rent
the country so disastrously. In those days the latter part
of the thirteenth century-Pistoja was, as it had long been,
a wealthy centre of trade, with a population cultured in
literature and the arts. With the traces it possesses of its
prosperity in the era preceding the thirteenth century, and
the remains of the artwhich followed up to the Renaissance,
Pistoja is a town of unusual interest.
TothestudentofthebeautifulGothicarchitecture of Italy,
which is due more to local influence or inspirationOri-
ental rather than Northern--this city presents in its several
churches a number of brilliant and rare features, often un-
touched examples, and illustrating the art from the earliest
period of Gothic to the rebirth of the Classic.
The position of the city, at the entrance from Lombardy,
11
173
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
an
into the Tuscan Valley by one of the most important de-
files of the Apennines, led the Lombards, at an early period,
to leave their mark upon it, and to the building activity
of these semi-barbarians, Pistoja, in company with so many
of the Italian towns, owes the erection of the majority of
its religious edifices in the busy eighth century of good
King Luitprand, whose pious zeal in raising churches and
conventual houses throughout his dominions even the in-
dustrious builders, the Magistri Comacini, could hardly
satisfy. These Pistojan churches, therefore, may be classed
among the oldest in Italy, but of their original construction
little remains ; a scarcely less marked epoch was to impress
them with a character which, for seven centuries, they have
been fortunate in retaining for our instruction and delight.
As for the Lombard foundations, their interest is per-
haps purely historical. The Lombards possessed no archi-
tecture of their own; their architects were Italians, students
--debased students, though their work was replete with
character-of the Roman ruins amid which they lived.
Here, in Pistoja, the inspiration of the architect has been
clearly Eastern, and the delicate polychromatic decoration,
the lozenges and marble mosaic, speak clearly of Byzan-
tium, of that second period of Oriental influence (the first
had been at Ravenna) which, when with the revival of
existence, for such it may be called, in the eleventh century,
Italy awoke to freedom and prosperity, its relations with
the East opened again freely the road to the artists of
Byzantium. To them it was that the Tuscan towns in their
prosperity appeared to erect for them the churches in which
they were desirous to display their splendour.
In the movement in which the sister arts of sculpture
and architecture were so indissolubly linked, Pistoja takes
174

ORVIETO CATHEDRAL : THE FONT.
EEEEEEE
THE ROMANESQUE: PISTOJA
1
a high place. If to the sculptor the churches of that city
present a field for suggestive study, to the architect there
is scarcely less material for profitable research, at a time
when what has long been known as the art of the Renais-
sance has taken such a hold upon us; a period which, the
more it is studied, the more it is found how easily the best
of it may be made to harmonise with the lovely Gothic
work of the thirteenth century.
The Cathedral of Pistoja, not one of the most remark-
able churches here, dates from the fifth century, but its
present enlarged and embellished aspect, the black and
white courses of marble, the characteristic type with which
one so soon becomes familiar in Tuscany, was given to it
in the thirteenth century, by that most industrious and
greatest of Italian architects, Niccola Pisano ; and many
are the beautiful details that the student will find on the
façade, the porch, and particularly the campanile, in which,
perhaps, a greater degree of beauty—the beauty of archaic
simplicity--may be found than in the world-sung bell-tower
of Florence, to protect which Charles V., as tradition says,
wished he could make a case as for a precious jewel.
Originally a donjon tower, it was adapted to its present
purpose by Pisano, who added three tiers of six arcades,
filled up above the line of the column caps with a mosaic
pattern in black and white marble. The transition from
the severity of the three lower stages of this tower to the
lightness and elegance of the arcaded upper ones has been
so skilfully managed that no abruptness is perceptible,
while charming effects of light and shade are produced by
the recession of the nucleus-coursed in black and white-
behind the arcades. The tower is finished off with those
forked battlements which constitute so striking a feature
175
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
in the Lucchese campanili, and a similar cresting is given
to the square turret, whose capping takes the form of a
short square-topped quadrangular spire, surmounted by a
small open bell-cote and spirelet of the same shape.
In the Pistojan churches, we find the Pisan blind arches
in the lower part and the façades with the lozenge-shaped
ornaments under the arches, but with this the resemblance
ceases, the upper part having in almost every instance been
rebuilt, probably when, as at Lucca, the naves were vaulted
in Renaissance days.
The northern side of the nave of the Duomo shows a
series of black and white wall arcades, shamefully mal-
treated by some architect of the classical period, whose
transformation of the eastern parts of the church, as well
as that of the clerestory, cannot be too strongly reprobated.
What a fall does all this show in that people who gave
us that Round-Gothic style of the Pisan and Lucchese
churches, which excite our admiration as much from the
simple majesty of their details as from the imposing gran-
deur of the mass !
Pistoja Cathedral is of very early origin, but was
enlarged and embellished in the thirteenth century. It
still retains the ancient form of its façade (c. 1166), with
storeys of arcade galleries and covered atrium, by a well-
known Pistojan architect and sculptor, Gruamonte, and
his brother Adeotus, as an inscription with the names of
both, of the above date, inform us. The church was built
in the eleventh century, during the lifetime of the Countess
Matilda, Sovereign of Tuscany; and the greater part of it
is of that period. The thirteenth-century alterations are
usually attributed to Niccola Pisano, but Ricci shows that
Pisano cannot have altered it further than by renewing
US
176
THE ROMANESQUE: PISTOJA
the vaulting and the tribune, which, as rebuilt by him,
was taken down in modern times to give place to the
present choir.
The interior of the Pistoja Duomo has been sadly
modernised at various dates, the choir, so lately as 1839,
the nave arcade being the only interesting part. It has ten
bays of boldly-foliaged Corinthian columns, the pier
between the eighth and ninth bays on either side being
square. There is a considerable wall space above the nave
arches, and then a miserable clerestory of square windows
and a groined roof of an equally wretched description. The
ninth column on either side of the nave stands on the floor
of the choir, which commences at this point, and is separ-
ated from the nave by a marble balustrade and iron gates
of the most beautiful workmanship. Of equal beauty is
the iron screen filling the arch opening from the south
aisle into the south transept, and that within the last bay of
the nave on either side, i.e., that part of it which is taken
into the choir to form the sanctuary, the chorus cantorum
being, as usual, in the apse. This has three compartments,
the central one being wider than that on either side of
it, and if memory serves aright-for I failed to make
any notes upon this part of the church-embellished with
very large Corinthian columns, set upon a dado, which
runs around the apse.
There is a handsomely wrought-iron candelabrum of
seven branches in the middle of the choir, and, completely
filling the sixth bay of the nave on the south side, a
Renaissance pulpit, supported on four red marble columns.
On either side of the steps to the sanctuary is another
flight conducting to the crypt.
In the Chapel of San Jacopo, off the south transept,
177
I 2
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
we see the celebrated silver shrine (paliotto), crowded with
miniature reliefs and statuettes-two figures of Our Lord
seated within vesicæ, one above the other, forming con-
spicuous objects in it—and forming, with the silver altar
frontal below, a magnificent specimen of metallurgic art.
Commenced in 1316, it was only completed by the labours
of many gifted masters in the fifteenth century.
The exterior of the eastern part of the church is a
horrible piece of Revived Italian, and a low square tower
rises above it. Perhaps the best part of the outside of
Pistoja Cathedral is the open porch in front of the west
end. It is a good specimen of Cinquecento work, quite
on the old twelfth- or thirteenth-century models. There
are seven arches, carried upon white marble columns with
capitals after the antique, the central arch being higher
and wider than the three on either side of it. The roof
over the central portion is barrel-vaulted and divided into
coffers richly adorned with yellow flowers on a blue
ground, all in Della Robbia ware, but the lateral bays are
poorly vaulted in the usual ribless quadripartite manner,
though showing traces of having been richly painted. In
the tympanum of the door leading to the nave is a lovely
Della Robbia Madonna, in majolica--white on a blue
ground. The Blessed Virgin and the Divine Child are
represented as being adored and crowned by angels, and
the framework of the enclosure is composed of a series of
winged boys (putti).
There is one feature the introduction of colour in con-
struction in which the Italian architects of the Middle
Ages excelled all others. In some districts it was accom-
plished by the use of brick, in others by the use of marble,
in others by the combination of stone and brick. Brick-
178
THE ROMANESQUE: PISTOJA
work was used either in the construction of the wall,
or only veneered to the surface. In Venice, the latter
was the more common system, and where it is not carried
over the whole surface of the wall, it is susceptible of
exceedingly beautiful treatment. That cannot, however,
be considered good architecture in which the construc-
tional features are either in part or altogether concealed,
and veneering is never admissible except when being
enclosed within some strong constructional form, as a
circle, an arch, or spandrel ; it seems rather to emphasise
than to conceal the construction.
I know nothing more beautiful than the effect upon a
wall of ordinary masonry of a medallion of marble arranged
in geometrical patterns and brilliant colours. The Venetians
especially excelled in this kind of work, and it is wonder-
ful how much value one small well-coloured medallion gives
to an entire wall.
The other system of colour may be seen much more fre-
quently, in fact, it may be called almost universal in that
part of Italy of which these pages treat.
First we have buildings coursed alternately with light
and dark stone, or light and dark marble. The exterior of
San Giovanni at Pistoja, and the nave piers of Orvieto and
Siena Cathedrals, well illustrate the manipulation of the
Central Italians with these materials. When the divisions
are nearly equal, as they are in the Churches of Genoa, the
Baptistery of Pistoja, and the Campanile of Siena Cathedral,
and in that of Prato, the effect is more bizarre and less
pleasing than when at most of the buildings at Pisa and
Lucca, and in the transept of Siena Cathedral, the dark
stone forms a comparatively small portion of the wall, in-
troduced in narrow courses, so as to mark the lines of sills,
ns a C
179
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
springings of arches, and the like, and occasionally by being
carried round the arches to give them a very marked out-
line. It may be taken as an axiom, that in all good construc-
tional colouring, some one colour must be selected as the
ground, and used therefore in larger quantity than any
other colour. One of the best and earliest examples of the
conjoint use of the three marbles which are the foundation
of all good constructional polychromy--red, grey and white
-is the Broletto at Como ; while Giotto's tower at Flor-
ence is the culminating glory of the style in this, as well
as in its architectural design; there the system is a com-
bination of the constructional and the veneering use of
marble, the courses generally being constructional, but the
windows being inserted (as in all the marble windows in
the Venetian palaces) in distinctly defined points, inlaid, as
it were, in the wall, and the several stages being marked
by inlaid patterns of extreme beauty in their design.
And here Giotto made use also of mosaic as a ground
for the sculpture, in the lower stage, behind the foliage
sculpture of the archivolt, and aiding greatly in the effect
of the marble shafts, in which it is often lavishly used.
The marble work of Genoa Cathedral is almost peculiar
to itself. There we have courses of dark and light stone,
each covered with patterns of great variety and effective-
ness, formed by letting dark marble into the light, and
light marble into the dark courses. In front of these stand
an array of shafts of different colours, some of them twisted
or carved very beautifully. In this Cathedral too, the arcades
of the nave are especially remarkable for their dark marble
columns, with a single block of white marble cunningly
introduced just above the base, and for the continuous
arcade (which takes the place of the triforium and looks
11
180
THE ROMANESQUE: PISTOJA
into the aisles) where the pillarets and piers are built of
alternate layers of light and dark marble.
The subject of natural polychromy, as displayed in the
Genoese and other churches of Central Italy, reintroduces
that of shafts. Those of my readers conversant with the
buildings of this part of Europe, must have noticed that the
architecture of Italy was from the first an architecture which
delightedin their use. They were of every conceivable form:
plain, twisted, sculptured, coupled, quadrupled, banded,
knotted together, inlaid either with coloured stone or with
brilliant mosaic of stone and of marble. Generally they
were slightly tapering, but, except in certain instances
which will be duly noticed, without any entasis. They were
applied as window monials, not only for domestic purposes,
but for ecclesiastical. There is, perhaps, no feature to which
Italian buildings are indebted for so much as these shafts,
well suited as they are to the natural products of different
portions of a country so rich in building material of the
most refined description.
Such a storehouse of suggestive study is Pistoja that,
like its hallowed neighbour, Pisa, its character is singularly
homogeneous. The town is stamped by the epoch to which
its monuments belong, an epoch of artistic and historicin-
terest.
It was to this period that, thirty years ago, one of the
greatest English architects devoted one of his most in-
structive lectures to the students of the Royal Academy.
And to that lecture the art-lover was indebted for a more
intimate acquaintance with this corner of Tuscany-verily
an enlarged Campo Santo to him. Pisa, Lucca, Pistoja and
Prato encircle Florence on the north like so many gems
surrounding the central brilliant in a rare jewel.
181
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
CHAPTER V
e
ca
The Gothic-1. Siena: Orvieto
ALTHOUGH it is desirable that the differences
nl between Gothic and Classic architecture should be
comprehended, yet it is possible to over-estimate the
opposition there may be between their principles, and
to the disadvantage of the art of architecture. Those who
devote themselves to the elucidation of theory rather
than practice, are apt to dwell too strongly upon the opposi-
tion without remembering sufficiently that the one style
actually grew out of the other, and that the history of
architecture, so long as it was a real and living art, was
one of progress and development.
The first links in this great chain were as valuable as the
last, and not one can be dispensed with. Because the
general tendency of Classic architecture was to breadth
and horizontality, therefore it is generally thought that
to be pure all vertical lines must be avoided ; and,
vice versa, it is popularly supposed that, because height
and verticality are the main principles affected in the
Gothic style, that therefore any approach to horizontal
lines are to be scrupulously avoided. Following out this
view of the matter, the late A. E. Freeman came to the
conclusion that the Perpendicular style, as in our English
Gothic, is the highest and only complete style; andthat those
preceding it were comparatively conditions of transition,
unsatisfactory so far, that the opposite element to its
perpendicularity and continuity of lines had not been
wholly overcome.
182
THE GOTHIC
see
From this point of view alone, the Gothic of Italy
might claim pre-eminence over all others. The struggle
there, between the two principles, was short, sharp and
decisive.
We see in it the gradual victory of verticalism
over horizontality, till, at last, the latter is wholly
eliminated, and a reedy weakness of effect is the result.
It need hardly be said that the practical architect will not
endorse this strained view of the question. It is well
known that, in the eyes of the best judges, the Gothic of
Italy never rose to the excellence of that in the countries
beyond the Alps. Even if the supposed principles of the
style were most thoroughly exhibited in it, yet it always
seemed to lack something of the true spirit.
The truth is, that in art-work some contrast is requisite
to give value to any principle. The expression of
dominance does not strike the mind if there be nothing
present to appear to succumb. The Greek Doric temple
admitted the triglyphs, in combination with the column, to
carry up the vertical lines sufficiently to give point to the
more prominent horizontal lines of the architecture and
cornice. In Westminster Abbey we may see, in the earlier
bays, a subtle elucidation of the same feeling, but in the
opposite direction, where the string-course over the
triforium is suffered to break round two out of the three
bearing-shafts of the vaulting, and thus the mastery of the
vertical principle is asserted by the central shaft passing
upwards unbroken through the string, while the string
passes round the side shafts, so as to secure sufficient
strength of its rhythmical apparent binding together of the
fabric. In Italian Gothic at its climax all such string-courses
are omitted—as for instance in the Cathedral at Arezzo, San
183
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
n-
Petronio at Bologna and the Church of Sta Maria Sopra
Minerva at Rome to the injury of the design, by the weak-
ness which the want of them seems to entail.
I alluded just now to the short, sharp, and decisive
struggle of these opposite principles in Italy. We have,
therefore, none of the several interesting phases—those
gradual transitions from style to style, that are so con-
spicuous in Transalpine countries, since the time was not
long enough to admit of them. We see through a part of
the career of Italian Gothic the harsh conflict of the
influence of the abundant Classic remains throughout
Italy, and where it did for a short time succeed in being
free, the result did not appear to advantage by the con-
trast, and it was soon set aside in favour of the revival of
Classic.
In decorative detail, however, as it might be supposed, in
presence of such vast stores of conventional Classic orna-
ment, Italian Gothic did not maintain the same conflict as
in the principles of construction, and throughout its career
it affected ancient precedents rather than natural types ; thus
the foliage of the acanthus is the general motif for the
carvings, with the sharp or round-lobed leaf, according as
Byzantine influence predominated in the different localities.
Take, for instance, the Church of San Petronio at Bologna,
which, although so far as size goes would, had it been com-
pleted, have been more than double the Duomo at Florence,
is one of the ugliest buildings ever designed or executed,
we see all the general characteristics, and also those of detail
above mentioned. Vertical lines so far preponderate that
there is absolutely no continuous horizontal line to be seen
within the structure, which gives it a weak, ill-connected
effect. Every artifice of the construction of the vaulting is
184
THE GOTHIC
scrupulously shown. The transverse rib, the diagonal rib-
and the wall rib, each with edge-moulds, is carried down
from ridge to pavement with all the impost mouldings,
broken round them, so that not even the capitals break the
continuity of these vertical lines ; the pier arches likewise
have their edge-mouldings carried down with those of the
vaulting ribs in the same compound pier.
In this structure we have all the general principles of
Gothic work carried almost to excess, and in the two
couplet-light windows of each of the chapels, two bays of
which are seen opening from a single bay of the aisle, we
have Gothic details in their subdivision into two-lights, by
mullions, acutely Pointed arches, which are cusped, have
cinque-foliated circles in their heads, and a multifoiled
cusped circle in the spandrel space above the two subarcua-
tions. There are also cusped octofoiled circular windows
in the upper space of the walling of both aisles and nave
beneath the wall ribs of the vaultings, and the method of
moulding all the edges of all the vaulting ribs and arches
is according to the true mediæval system. Nevertheless,
there is, with all this, a lack of Gothic feeling and strong
reminiscences of Classical work to be seen in the great
comparative breadth of thecompartments, in the flatpilaster-
like form of the bearing member of the transverse rib of the
vaulting, and in the section of that rib itself; in the treat-
ment of the banded imposts, which serve as capitals at the
level of the springing of the pier arches, but which are wholly
different from pure Gothic capitals, and in their successive
ranges of acanthus-like leaves recall the Corinthian type.
Then, by the repetition of the same class of enriched banded
imposts at the springing of the vaulting ribs, the effect given
is of a secondary stage of Classic pilasters, placed upon,
185
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
UU
1
though without intervening base, the lower impost of the
pier of the nave arcade.
Again, for I have not done with this unfortunate struc-
ture yet-in the plain oblong-sectioned pier of division
between the aisle and the chapels, with its quasi-cornice
as impost and absence of edge-moulding to those arches,
it is as if the architect had forgotten for the nonce the rôle
he had been endeavouring to play, and had in forgetfulness
relapsed to the Classic character, with which he was really
more familiar. There is no straining after height, no feeling
of growth in the structure, no subdivision into ascending
stages of arcade, triforium and clerestory, no contrast by
strings to enhance the value of what height there is, no
delicate proportionings of the several capitals to the scale of
the members they have to support. But, instead, there is a
contentment with the breadth of the several surfaces, and
an independence of the separate features, which gives a pain-
fully disconnected character to the whole.
Take another case. If we turn to Milan Cathedral,
usually considered one of the glories of Italian Gothic
architecture, we are struck almost with surprise that such
a forest of pinnacles can fail to convey the true feeling of
the aspiring Gothic style. In this sumptuous work, con-
structed in white marble with the utmost elaboration, the
flat pitch of the roofs seems to restrain the efforts to carry
the eye upward, which otherwise their elegantoutlinewould
seem calculated to do.
Of specimens of the Gothic just after its emancipation
from the Romanesque, I came across very few in the large
towns visited during this journey. To inspect such I had
to deviate to places not frequently visited by the ordinary
traveller ; but, at Toscanella, where, after a sixteen-mile
186
THE GOTHIC
SO
walk from Viterbo I was rewarded by the sight of one of
the loveliest churches in the Transitional style to be seen
in Italy or out of it-I allude to Sta Maria; in the solemn
old Cistercian Abbey Churches of Sta Maria d'Arbona,
near Chiesi, in the recesses of the Abruzzi; San Galgano,
some 20 miles distant from Siena; Fossanova, on the Via
Appia, about 70 miles south-east of Rome (where, by the
way, the late Mr Jas. Brooks must have derived some
ideas for his noble Church of St Columba in the Kings-
land Road, London, particularly as regards his treatment
of the crux); Chiaravelle della Colomba, near Perugia ;
Chiaravelle di Castagnola, near Ancona; Casamari; and
San Martino al Cimino, about 8 miles from Viterbo;
at each of these places I found an Early Pointed church,
of great size, dignity, highest architectural interest and
solemnity, which not only surpassed the most sanguine
expectations, but certainly gave me far deeper pleasure
than their much-vaunted, and more sumptuous successors
at Orvieto, Siena, Florence, and Arezzo, that everybody
goes to see.
In Northern countries, and generally wherever Gothic
architecturehad takenanything like a firm root, the struggle
between the Gothic and the Classic was a much harder one.
Italy, though a fashion rather than a taste had induced
a partial approximation to the forms of Northern archi-
tecture, never really loved or even understood it; to the
Italian it spoke of nothing that was dear to his heart, or
cherished by the recollections of past ages; all his fondest
associations were bound up with the antagonist style, and its
restoration seemed to be, and indeed really was, the re-
jection of an unnatural bondage.
The revival of the Classic in Italian architecture was not
187
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
connected with any theological differences whatever; it
was the simple heathenism of art. To attribute a change
which arose in Italy as early as the end of the fourteenth
century to the Reformation in the sixteenth, is simply belied
by facts; the Reformation promoted but did not cause a
change which, as it so happened, had been fostered by
Popes, not, however, as Popes, but as Italians. Yet the two
are connected, but by a subtler change than that of direct
cause and effect; it was one and the same spirit, working in
different channels, which raised a Borgia and a Medicis to
the throne of Hildebrand and Innocent, which reared a
Brunelleschi to corrupt the taste, a Henry to destroy the
fabrics, and a Luther and a Socinus to assault the faith of
the Church ; heartily as many of them cursed and hated one
another, all were doing the same work, and all sprung from
the same source the fall of the old faith, and glory of
Teutonic Christendom before the self-will, the faithless-
ness, the heathenism of the Renaissance. .
One of the most noteworthy features of Italian architec-
ture is its independence. There seems only a very slight
connection between the style in vogue in one town, or group
of towns, and that of another. Even the continuity of its
history in one place is often most difficult to understand,
designs springing up constantly founded upon nothing that
has gone before, and contemptuously indifferent to pre
cedent. It is impossible to classify the architecture of Italy
by dividing it into periods like that of the North.
Among the Gothic works in Italy, while some seem to
have sprung indigenously in the manner in which I have
pointed out, others seem to owe direct influence to an im-
portation beyond the Alps. The latter are somewhat florid
in the later German fashion. Again, at Venice the style took
1
188
THE GOTHIC
a decidedly Oriental aspect, derived from Byzantine and
Saracenic work. The space at my command does not permit
me to follow out the minor varieties or purely local charac-
teristics, but considering the Italian Gothic details, as com-
pared with those of other countries, the use of shafts in
place of the mullion is a very distinctive feature. This, no
doubt, is because the Classic column was always before their
eyes. It, however, breaks the continuity of lines in a manner
at variance with the Gothic spirit, and still more when
banded imposts take the place of capitals, and are super-
imposed upon ribbon pilasters and clustered shafts so wide
as to recall the Classic proportions. The windows of Or
San Michele at Florence, for instance, exhibit the latter
treatment, and the tracery is worth examination. The
Pointed arch is but occasional in them, and is the result
of intersecting semicircular arches, which form the leading
lines.
Although the principle of subordination is attended to
in the mouldings, the profiles lack boldness and depth, and
consist of fillets and shallow hollows. The openings are foli-
ated and cusped, but in the tracery form but a small pro-
portion as compared to the surface of the solid spandrels
between them. These spandrels, some ungainly shaped, are
decorated with foliage of the acanthus type, with which a
profusion of carved dog-teeth form a strange medley. The
windows in the south side of Arezzo Cathedral may be
taken as good illustrations of this treatment.
Another prominent feature in Italian Gothic buildings
are the small trefoil arcades used as pendant ornaments
under cornices and string-courses, and even under the sills
of windows, and carried up under raking copings.
Then the profuse use of panelling and the coffering of
189
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the under sides of arches, as at Siena, are Classic elements
continually interpolated; the former, which is, as it were,
translated into tracery, the window openings being cut up
into similar shapes by horizontal transoms crossing the
mullions, occur in the Cathedral and Campanile of Florence;
the latter in Siena Cathedral. The transoms, though dis-
guised as bands of tracery, are inimical to the character
at least of ecclesiastical Gothic architecture, though more
in harmony with domestic, in which the subdivision of the
interior by floors is legitimately marked by the similar
expedient.
In the Church of SS. Giovanni and Paolo at Venice, this
tracery band is composed of a double row of quatrefoiled
circles, and at Siena Cathedral a single row has its power
of interrupting the vertical tendency of the mullions, by
the lights over it having reversed arches with their points
downwards. Then, as if to prevent the Pointed arch assert-
ing its legitimate and natural effect, with strange incon-
sistency it is often set within a square frame. In the door-
ways, which were made prominent features and often very
beautiful ones, this curious conflict between opposite prin-
ciples is perhaps more remarkable. For example, a door-
way in San Stefano at Venice is set within jambs and lintel,
which are decorated, though with great richness, precisely
as returned Classical architraves, and above this is a cusped
foliaged-arched head as a panel, with the arch mouldings
returned some distance, and stopped by bosses of foliage
on either side, whence spring flanking pinnacles, wholly
useless and unmeaning ornaments, and bunchy carved
crockets run up the curved side of a projecting portion
of the arch mouldings (not a label); and on a finial at the
apex, which does not rise properly out of the arch mould-
190
THE GOTHIC
ma
ings, a statue is placed. No beauty of execution or materiał
could compensate for the thorough misapprehension of the
several features enumerated.
I have not space to pursue the subject further in this
place, and as I have been led in following out my argu-.
ment to take a rather gloomy view of a phase of art which,
with all its inconsistencies, has many merits, and in which
many a work has been produced which is full of artistic
suggestions, I shall return to it in the descriptions of the
several cathedrals and churches selected in this chapter for
illustration, and view it from perhaps a more favourable
point of view, which will be a perfectly just one, if the
caution I have now given be borne in mind.
It seems very like presumption to criticise such build-
ings as the Cathedrals of Milan, Florence, Orvieto and
Siena, yet, pace the Atheneum, the Morning Post and the
Contemporary Review, I know not the use of architectural
study and travel if it is to be pursued with that blind
faith which obliges one to admire indiscriminately every-
thing that was built-particularly by Italians—in the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.
In the last-named publication I fell under the accusa-
tion of following too closely in the footsteps of James
Fergusson and George Edmund Street. To this, I can only
reply that if I have sinned, it has been in the company of
two most distinguished men, for both of whom I have,
and ever shall have, the greatest admiration, and who will
be remembered long after their reviewers are forgotten.*
* It is impossible to overrate the actual value of the influence, even
to the extent of inculcating principles, which a constant familiarity with
the writings and works of these two great critics, exercised upon the.
author's early years.
191
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
It may also be added, for the benefit of the amateur
reviewer, that I have the honour of numbering among my
friends some of the first architects of the day, all of whom
concur with me in placing the cathedrals and churches of
North-eastern France in the first rank; then those of our
own country; and thirdly those of North - western
Germany.
The Cathedral of Siena is like a vase filled with the
memories of the past and the gems of Genius-a focus in
which are concentrated the thoughts and energies of ages;
the successive schools of art, from naïve simplicity to de-
veloped excellence ; the spirit of the Middle Ages and of
the Renaissance all fused together, with a result that
baffles criticism.
The strange vicissitudes of this building are manifest
in the majestic piles of unfinished architecture adjoining
the southern transept and advancing far beyond the limits
of the actual church-like comparatively modern ruins
which tell of the projected enlargement, undertaken and
abandoned in the fourteenth century, and which present
features of Gothic and Renaissance combined — an in-
teresting monument to a Transitionary period.
As at Orvieto, the concentration of artistic beauties
and elaborate decoration is on the marble façade, com-
pared with which the rest of the exterior, except the
campanile, with its graceful arcade windows increasing in
number as they ascend, after a fashion common in Central
Italy, seems plain.*
On that façade the patriotism, as well as piety, of those
who raised it appears. In the marble company of saints,
on pilaster summits or panels, all, except those of the Old
* See illustration, p. 28.
.
192
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
Testament, are Sienese citizens; and the vigorous colossal
forms of animals on projecting brackets are devices of
Italian cities confederate with Siena. On the highest
tympanum among the Gothic details is a gilt relief of
the Assumption ; and below, alike in gilt sculptures, San
Bernardino and Sta Caterina kneeling in ecstasy. Siena
Cathedral might be considered among sanctuaries of the
Madonna, for the intent to do her honour is perceptible
on every side. The representation of the Assumption is
not only conspicuous on the façade, but is the object
that first attracts our notice as we enter, in another gilt
relief, so placed under the cupola as to hover above the
choir arch; and on the pavement near the threshold we
read the lines : “Sanctissimum Virginis Templum caste
memento ingredi" --reminding us of the olden appella-
tion of Siena : “Sena vetus civitas Virginis ”; and of the
spirit that speaks in one of those devoutly-prefaced con-
tracts of the Opera for this Cathedral : “It is decreed,
seeing that no government or state can maintain or
regulate itself without the aid of the Omnipotent God,
and of His most holy mother, Advocate of this our
City,” etc.
The history of this Cathedral is associated with that of
Siena itself, and so strangely complicated that it is not
surprising to find errors in long-admitted traditions on
the subject. The first notice of a church on this site occurs
in the year 100o, and the first list of artists engaged in
restoring or embellishing the original Duomo extends
from 1229 to 1236, during which period the building
was lengthened, and in 1262 was undertaken the new
cupola (of hexagonal form) or the completing of one
already commenced.
193
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Ricci, in his Storia dell' Architettura Italiana, infers
that the church might have existed from about 947, and
we have the certain historic notices of an enlargement
undertaken in 1087, as also of the consecration performed
by Pope Alexander III. in 1171. In 1245 Niccola Pisano,
great both as architect and as sculptor, was commissioned
to build a new façade, but his work (whether completed
or not) was taken down less than forty years afterwards,
to give place to another by his son, Giovanni, commenced
in 1284; adorned with statues by Agostino and Agnola
of Siena, 1317; and in 1333 entirely covered with marbles.
In 1317 was commenced the facade of the Baptistery (no
longer used as such, and now known as the Church of
San Giovanni, which forms, so to speak, a crypt under the
choir of the Cathedral), and is a finer, because more pure,
example of the Pointed style than is any other portion of
the actual buildings. This was completed in 1382 by Gia-
como di Miro, called Pelliciajo.
proposed the erection of a new Cathedral, in scale and
magnificence surpassing the ancient one.
There is no documentary proof that this project was
then adopted by the authorities, but it is certain that, up
to 1333, neither the general plan nor the direction of the
older buildings had been altered. In 1339 it was decreed
that the body of the church should be built on a larger
scale, and with different orientation, so that the ancient
should become the transepts of the new Cathedral ; and an
architect, named Lando, was invited from Naples to super-
intend the building, as he did till his death, in 1340.*
* This partially constructed work is seen in the illustration on
page 28.
194
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
After the raging of the plague which desolated all Tuscan
cities, and visited with more or less severity all other
Italian provinces between 1348 and 1350, the municipal
council resolved that, seeing the want of hands to labour
and the immensity of estimated costs, the works for the
enlarged Duomo should be abandoned, and that the project
should be limited to the embellishment of the old, apart
from any undertaking of new constructions. Thenceforth
the works, with this change of purpose, continued unin-
terrupted till the early years of the fifteenth century.
From 1362 to 1397 eight intaglio artists and two painters
were engaged in the choir, the painted glass of which was
finished in 1369; other fine examples of glass-painting in
different windows being by Ambrogio di Bindo, a Cam-
aldalese monk, who died in 1416. The “ Cænacolo” in
the circular window above the grand west entrance was
finished in 1400.
The prophets, noblest among the statues now on the
façade, are the earliest works of Jacopo della Quercia,
who flourished at the beginning of the fifteenth century,
and the relief-busts over the three portals of Sienese
“beati".B. Ambrogio Sansedoni, B. Giovanni Colom-
bini (founder of the Gesuati order) and B. Andrea Galler-
ini—are by a seventeenth-century artist, named Redi.
In 1369 the celebrated intarsio work of the payement
of the interior was commenced. In no portions, how-
ever, is it ascribable, as believed, to Duccio, who had no
existence at that date ; and the true commesso art, here
exemplified in its best attainment, was invented by
Beccafumi (1484-1549), whose beautiful adjuncts to this
pavement date from 1500. Many admirably designed
figures, which are merely incised on the surface, are of
ice was
195
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the fifteenth and some of the fourteenth century;
the Cardinal Virtues, of about 1406; the Ten Sibyls, by
different artists, commenced in 1481; the Histories of
Joshua and of Moses, 1426; and one subject, perhaps
unique in sacred art, the Parable of the Mote and the
Beam, dramatically represented by two figures, about 1433.
On the pavement before the three great western door-
ways, is the consecration of the Cathedral, in three groups
and of the date 1451. Coeval with these, and outside the
entrance to the Baptistery, are curious rather than beauti-
ful representations of the Nativity and the Baptism.
The decree of 1350 was followed by another, seven
years later, setting forth that the new buildings should be
demolished, because they threatened ruin ; and in 1356,
the capo maestro, Dominico d'Agostino, gave it as his
opinion, confirmed by other architects, that the proposed
demolition of the old church would cost more than 150,000
gold florins, and that more than a century would be required
for the building of the new one.
Avariety of sculptures and paintings, of different periods,
gives to the interior of Siena Cathedral the character of a
sacred museum ; yet the religiousness of idea and purpose
is so successfully carried out, thạt no sense of the unsuit-
able or profane can enter the mind within this glorious
and venerable house of God.
Standing under the hexagonal cupola, which, with its
drum surrounded by a Romanesque arcade, and lit by
narrow, deeply-splayed windows, seems to belong to the
oldest building, I could not but observe how strong is the
line that separates the newer from the more ancient parts;
for the Pointed style is here manifestly a superaddition,
and this attempt at amalgamation between the Gothic and
196
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
the Romanesque, interesting however anomalous, is what
gives to the Siena Duomo its significance and importance
in the history of Italian architecture.
I believe that Ughelli, in his Italia Sacra is mistaken
in finding allusion to the laying of the first stone for some
new construction of this interior, in 1300, by the bishop
of the see, Raynaldo, in the following lines, with Gothic
letters, read on the façade :-
“ Annus centenus Romæ semper est jubileus.
Crimina laxuntur, cui pænitet ista donantur
Hic declaravit Bonifacius, et roboravit,”-
though the date implied, that year of jubilee, be here
unquestionable.
It is satisfactory to state that the works of reparation
at this Cathedral have been, as far as I was in a position
to judge, intelligently and conservatively conducted. The
statues of prophets and kings, on the front pilasters, have
been, where requisite, retouched ; also some of the sym-
bolic animals ; and two esteemed artists of Siena, Saurocchi
and Maccari, executed, between thirty and forty years ago
statues or busts of twenty-four saints of the Old Testa-
ment for the upper part of that façade, even then so richly
laden with works of art.
I have dwelt elsewhere, and in my résumé of the ancillary
arts, upon the celebrated example of mediæval sculpture
in this Cathedral--the pulpit by Niccola Pisano (1267),
a marvel of self-emancipating genius-so pass on, after
these few generalising remarks on the Cathedral, to a
somewhat more detailed description.
At Siena the Cathedral is open all day long, not being,
as is universally the case with the parochial churches in
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Own
Italy (and I may also add, of Belgium) closed between
noon and four. It stands east and west upon a considerable
elevation, which towards the east descends abruptly, so
that there is a great space underneath the choir, which has
been turned to noble account by the formation beneath it
of the Baptistery, known as the Church of St John the
Baptist. This is entered from the east by three grand
portals, above which is the east end of the Cathedral choir
with its buttresses, each in two concave divisions, and its
series of shaftless arcades under the three great windows,
of which that at the extremity of either aisle is of two
lights and most richly and deeply splayed. The central
window is a mere outline having, in all probability, been
denuded of its tracery when the shallow apse was formed
inside. The manner in which the capitals of the reversed
shafts to the two side windows is carried in the form of
a cornice right across the façade and sweeping round the
concaves of the buttresses, is very remarkable.*
It need hardly be said that this under-church gives the
eastern elevation of the choir of Siena Cathedral an ap-
pearance of unusual dignity, while from the greater
sobriety of its details and materials I must confess that it
afforded me more real enjoyment than the overwrought
western façade, with all its wealth of statuary and mosaic
work.
I know nothing lovelier than the colouring of this
east end of Siena Cathedral, the main walls being of a
pearly grey, while the details are worked in rich deep
umber.
At the top of the flight of steps leading from the plateau
* The large untraceried circle in the wall at the top lights the east
end of the choir above the interpolated apse.
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THE GOTHIC: SIENA
em
on which the Duomo is built to the street below, on the
east, is a very beautiful doorway, which would appear to
have formed a part of that wonderful new nave that, but
for circumstances already detailed, would have converted
the present nave and choir into transepts.
In composition the façade of Siena Cathedral surpasses
that of Orvieto ; it is plainer and broader and more logi-
cal ; it is crowded with ornament; but this, in a climate like
Italy, does not seem out of place, and certainly does not
interfere with the whole effect, but rather gives scale and
dignity. The west front, being so striking and more elabor-
ate than any other part, naturally attracts all one's atten-
tion, and when one has described it, he may be said to have
described the exterior of Siena Cathedral, though the lofty
campanilema work of much earlier date than the west front,
-is a beautiful feature, and resembling in detail most of
the Tuscan campanile, beginning low down with a window
on each face, in each storey, the number increasing towards
the top.
The church is built of black and white with some red
and other coloured marbles in stripes. The campanile is
all black and white. Like the country itself, its people and
their habits, one needs to be accustomed to this lavish
display of costly material and constructional polychromy,
before it becomes truly pleasing.
The hexagonal dome is very little visible from the out-
side, and, with the exception of the lantern on the top,
which is very pretty, is hardly pleasing.
Passing into the interior, one is struck by its seeming
great extent, the effect of which is much increased by
the unusual width of the transepts, the eye wandering
through a grove of columns and discovering no end to
199
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Srl
the glimpses of distant space which it discovers in every
direction.*
The black and white marble piers throughout the church
are in plan a square, with semicircular shafts attached to
each face. The bases are circular and moulded, and the
capitals have acanthus-like flowers. There are five bays to
the nave, and four to the choir, and the dome being hexa-
gonal, the great central pier supporting it on the north and
south sides naturally occurs right in the middle of the open-
ing to either transept.
The longitudinal arches are semicircular throughout the
Cathedral. There is no triforium, but instead of it a heavy
horizontal corbel-tabling runs round the church, composed
of a series of heads of the Roman pontiffs in terra-cotta
alto-relievo, down to Alexander III., whose bust has re-
placed one of John VIII., which, till the year 1600, occu-
pied a medallion on the north side of the nave, with the
inscription: “ Johannes VIII., Fæmina de Anglia” beneath
it, in order to commemorate the supposed native country
of that mythical personage, Pope Joan,
Above this corbel-tabling of busts is a lofty clerestory
of Pointed windows, glazed in very small leaded hexagonal
quarries, as is usual in many Italian churches. The
head of the window is as it were one plane of stone,
perforated with a quatrefoil (set lozenge-wise) above two
quatrefoils (set square-wise) all above three trefoiled lights,
which are divided by complete shafts as monials.
* In the Architect of ioth December 1886, is the reproduction of a
very beautiful pencil-drawing of the interior of this Cathedral by Mr
Gerald Horsley.
† It should be observed that the four arches of the choir do not rise
directly from the abaci of the columns, but from pilasters superim-
posed upon them.
200
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
One window on either side of the nave has a species of
transom, formed by the junction of the two trefoils, the
upper one being, of course, inverted. In the vaulting, which
is painted blue and studded with gold stars to represent
the "star-spangled canopy of heaven,” the arches spanning
-
and diagonal ribs are pointed. As is usual in Continental
Gothic, even during its richest and best phases the vaulting
at Siena is quadripartite, or four-celled, the object being to
get as much space as possible for pictorial enrichment.
The bays are not square, as usually in Italian Pointed, but
oblong, and are slightly domical. The diagonal ribs are very
strongly developed.
The great hexagon at the junction of the four arms has
rari
ml
10.
lights. Shafts, which look as if they had been meant to
support vaulting ribs, rise from the abacus of each great pier
of this hexagon, but their capitals are now merely sur-
mounted by not very pleasing gilt figures. Above the head
of each figure a pendentive, worked to resembletheshell-like
head of a Renaissance niche, subdivides the tambour of the
cupola into a twelve-sided figure. Above this is a row of
statues capped by a low dome.
There is a circular window at the east end of the choir
which, as I have already observed, has its straight wall
scooped out into a shallow semicircular recess, and another
in the corresponding place at the west end of the nave.
Both are filled with ancient stained glass, which in the
eastern circle is of the most exquisite description.
The circle is divided into nine spaces. In the three central
spaces forming the upright portion of the cross, are the
Death, Assumption, and Coronation of the Blessed Virgin.
201
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
On either side, forming the arms of the cross, are two saints
within multifoiled medallions, and in the four spherical
spaces made by the circumference of the circle with the
cross are the Evangelists, seated each with his symbol.
The whole colouring of this window is most delicate,
especially that of the Coronation group, the blue in the
robe of the Virgin Mary flashing forth like a jewel from the
white groundwork. There is some very beautiful floral
patterns in the borders to the nine compartments, and in
that which follows the line of the circle, which is enriched
with very large cherubs' heads gilt, decreasing in size as
they reach the top. .
The high altar stands nearly in the centre of the choir,
of which the part appropriated to the clergy is here, as in
nearly every Italian church, situated, in the apse, around
which the stalls are arranged along the east wall facing
westward. The three bays between the transepts and the
altar are unenclosed.
There is one great advantage in the altar standing in
this position, or quite at the west end of the choir-namely,
that the celebrant and his assistant ministers can be easily
seen by the congregation, and the view of them is not often
obstructed by lecterns, as is often the case when the altar
stands on nearly the same level as the choir floor, while in
some churches for the opposite reason, when the choir is
excessively raised above the level of the nave, as for instance
in the Cathedral at Modena and the Church of Santa Maria
della Pieve at Arezzo, it becomes necessary for the altar to
be placed at the top of the flight of steps leading up to the
choir, which is there elevated so suddenly that if the altar
stood at the extreme east end it would be quite invisible
202
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
On the stalls is some of that elaborate carving and in-
tarsia work in which the Italian artists excelled, and in
the choir before each column, at some little distance from
1
lamp, while marble statues occupy similar positions before
the columns in the nave.
The pulpit, standing within the first bay of the choir on
the north side, is a beautiful work of Niccola Pisano and
his pupils. It is octagonal, standing on a central shaft, with
eight others round it. The bases of alternate shafts rest on
lions, either eating or suckling other animals, and the
capitals are exquisitely flowered under a moulded abacus,
with little birds nestling among the leaves. The shafts are
cylindrical and the bases, boldly annulated, repose upon
octagonal plinths. The shafts support trefoiled arches, and
the eight sides of the pulpit are composed of bas-reliefs,
perhaps a little too.crowded, representing scenes in the Life
1
on an eagle, and the whole stands on a square basement or
plinth. The steps leading up to the pulpit have a beautiful
balustrade and other work in the best Early Renaissance
style.
From this ambo the Gospel was sung by the deacon facing
southwards at High Mass on St Simon and St Jude's Day.
The sub-deacon, who had previously sung the epistle facing
the altar, stood at his right hand, and he was also attended
by the thurifer and two acolytes bearing lighted tapers.
There was plenty of room for them, the space within the
pulpit being very large.
In Siena Cathedral we are treading upon nothing but
what is costly-I refer to the unique and beautiful pave-
ment, engraved with various histories and single figures in
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
black outlines on a white ground, produced by incisions
having been made in the marble, and then filled up with
black cement.
A greater portion of this wonderful pavement at Siena
is kept covered, except at a certain time in the year, with
boards, in order to preserve it from getting worn away by
being trod on. Its general tone is extremely quiet, and
harmonises admirably with the costly materials of the
pillars and walls.
That this pavement at Siena is the only incised one
tolerably perfect, it is certain ; and although of different
dates, and consequently of different styles, it still retains
its unity of arrangement. The first in order of time are
the representations of the Virtues, which are arranged round
the high altar : they are all referable, with one or two ex-
ceptions, to the beginning of the fifteenth century. The
illustrations represent Justice, surrounded firstly by a
richly cusped circle, and then by a square border, at the
angles of which are represented the winged lamps of
Knowledge. I forget whether the Italians, who always knew
who did everything, or if they do not always inyent, refer
the designs of these to Buoninsegna or Simone Memmi.
However that may be, they are beautifully drawn, and are
certainly, without exception, the very finest incised slabs
which have descended to us. The rest of the church is thus
mapped out. Rich borders run from pillar to pillar, both
north and south, and east and west. These again enclose
rich borders, separated from them by bands of plain marble.
In the nave, within these last, we find principally scenes
from Holy Scripture, executed during the latter half of the
fifteenth century ; some of them of later date are assigned
to Beccafumi. Others, again, are earlier, more particularly a
204
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
curious collection of mediæval emblems of the Italian cities
in opus vermiculatum, which probably dates considerably
before the present Cathedral. Other subjects are the Wheel
of Fortune, the Seven Ages of Man, Socrates and Crates
climbing the Mountain of Virtuema curious instance of
“Paganism in the Middle Ages" ;-together with the
Ten Sibyls, and figures of Faith, Hope and Charity; these
last and the Sibyls are placed in the aisles, and belong to
the sixteenth century.
Early in the “ seventies” of the last century Mr Spencer
Stanhope greatly interested himself in the preservation
of these wonderful pavements in Siena Cathedral. Some
friends, who were much interested in their noble designs,
pressed him, as he was frequently in Italy, to see what
could be done to secure some good records of them ; for
though quite the finest works there, they were, at that
time, left altogether unprotected, to undergo the process
of gradual effacement by the feet of those who walked over
them, which process was, alas ! nearly completed in the case
of some of them, whilst, strange to say, the designs by
Beccafumi were as well cared for by the authorities as the
others were neglected. For this purpose Mr Stanhope
went to Siena in 1875, and the result of his inquiries was,
that no rubbings or tracings had been taken of them, the
only records being some small, feeble, unsatisfactory copies,
which were on view in the Opera del Duomo.
Having satisfied himself whilst there that it was pos-
sible to rub them, Mr Stanhope made arrangements with
a friend to undertake the experiment on a large scale, which
he did bytakingrubbings of the figures of most of the Sibyls.
As the result was satisfactory, he wrote to Mr Poynter, to
ask him whether the South Kensington Museum authori-
205
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
ties would give Captain Danyell (that was the friend's
name) a commission to rub some of the most important
designs. This, Poynter arranged at once, leaving it to
Captain Danyell and himself to select the works to be done.
The actual rubbing proved a tedious and troublesome
process, from a variety of causes, many of which were un
usual. But efficient assistance was forthcoming, and the
operators worked away with a will, and succeeded in
reproducing the following subjects and figures :- The
Cacciata di Erode, the Death of Absalom, the border of
the same subject, Justice, Prudence, the Emperor on his
Throne, the Massacre of the Innocents, and the border
of the same.
Of these, far the finest are the Massacre of the Innocents
and the Cacciata di Erode (also, I believe, called the Judas
Maccabæus design). Of the former, a portion had been
destroyed and could not be taken, but in the main both
of these grand designs were in fair preservation and rubbed
well. The Death of Absalom and the Emperor on his
Throne are much smaller than the first two, and could only
be rubbed with difficulty. Prudence and Justice are single
figures. The border of the Massacre of the Innocents is
remarkable, having a frieze representing Bacchanals. A
commencement of restoring these “ dalles” was made in
1876, but the modern restorations, judging from the Sibyls
in the nave aisles, can hardly be praised ; therefore it was
a great gain to have secured rubbings of the finest portions
of the old work before it was meddled with. The rub-
bings having reached South Kensington, Poynter had
them carefully prepared for photographing, and they were,
I believe, shortly afterwards, published in a volume of two
sizes.
206
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
From a doorway in the north aisle of the nave, around
which is some fine Renaissance work, we enter the cele-
brated Piccolomini Library, enriched with beautiful fres-
coes by Pinturicchioand by Raffaele when he was a student.
These were finished in 1503, and are perfectly preserved.
They represent scenes in the life of Pius II., Æneas Silvius.
Piccolomini. The room-of which a very fine view is to be
found among the Arundel Society's publications, was erect-
ed and this work procured for it by Pius III., his nephew.
The choir-books, which are splendidly illuminated, are kept
in this room. The illuminations are, however, late in style,
and, though wonderful, are not very beautiful or worthy
of much study; but the frescoes certainly are, and to those
interested in mediæval costumes, afford an admirable field
of study. The pavement also of this grand library at Siena.
is an interesting piece of majolica tiling, and the ceiling is
beautifully painted in the best manner of the Renaissance,
and is quite fresh and brilliant. It is a scheme of colour-
ing which is suitable to good Gothic work and Classic
alike, and from it one may judge of the effect of clear pure
colouring harmoniously blended, showing that there is no
difficulty in using red and blue and gold-pleasant brilliant
tinctures instead of sombre greens and greys. It is said
this room was built specially for the reception of the
Office-books used in the choir.
Siena has cause to be thankful that her Cathedral has
escaped being “ Classicised."
Though Italian churches have not suffered mutilation
at the hands of religious fanatics, still many a noble edifice
has been ruthlessly disfigured by the so-called restoration
of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Take
three examples-the Cathedral of Ferrara and the Churches.
207
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
of San Gregorio at Spoleto and San Michele at Pisa. The
zeal of the innovators at that period led them to destroy,
or at least conceal, those portions which they considered to
be the work of a barbarous age, but which are now, owing
to a better appreciation of early Christian art, carefully
preserved when rediscovered beneath some abominable
pseudo-Classical mask.
Underneath the choir, and formed, as I have already
said, by the rapid slope of the ground from west to east,
is the Baptistery, or, as it is generally termed, the Church
of San Giovanni, which I was fortunate enough to visit
early one morning, for during the day, from half-past nine
or so onwards, it is closed for public worship.
I was, therefore, enabled to enjoy a leisurely inspection
of this exquisite under-church, which in plan is an oblong,
divided from east to west into two, and from north to
south into three bays, springing jointly from two mag-
nificent columns of white stone, with leaves of the à
crochet type in the deep bells of their capitals. The
responds, or half-piers in the walls at their centres and
angles are, like the walls themselves, in alternate layers of
white and black. On the eastern side are the three noble
doorways, seen in the view of the exterior, and in which
it will be observed the arches of the lateral ones are pointed,
while that of the central one is semicircular.
The manner in which the archivolt mouldings run
through the secondary imposts, if not quite so disagree-
ably marked as at Orvieto, is noticeable.
Internally, the southern wall is blank in one bay, but is
pierced with a lancet in the other ; the two bays on the
opposite side have each a lancet; all these are very deeply
ch
208
THE GOTHIC: SIENA
recessed into a three-sided apse completely covered with
paintings, and contains an altar. The cells of the six com-
partments of quadripartite vaulting are likewise profusely
painted, but into a detailed account of all these enrich-
ments, their artists, and so on, it is impossible within these
limits to enter. Suffice it to say that the tout ensemble is
gorgeous in the extreme. Against the wall, on either side
the central apse, is an altar, that to the right having a re-
tabulum in three divisions, with metal framework, com-
posed of three foliated arches under gables, and flanked
by pinnacles in the conventional Middle Pointed manner.
The other altar-piece is of stone, with an octofoiled arch
under a tall gable with crockets and a cross at its apex, and
flanked by narrow, square-topped wings and pinnacles.
Neither of these altars has a frontal. The northern one has
its mensa supported on four octagonal colonnettes ; the
southern one has five trefoiled arcades on circular ones.
Within the central bay, immediately in front of the
apse, stands that well-known font, of which there are fac-
similes in plaster in the central hall of the Harris Free
Library at Preston and at South Kensington.
This structure, commissioned in 1416, designed by
Jacopo della Quercia (1371-1438), and executed with the
assistance of his pupils, Pietro del Minella, Nanni da Lucca,
and others, is of white marble, excellent in its proportions,
and as graceful a specimen of the Cinquecento style to be
found anywhere. The frieze of the upper part of the hexa-
gonal basin and the plinth are in blue enamel, the upper
one bearing inscriptions in bronze, with quotations from
the Gospels on the subject of Baptism.
The bronze reliefs and figures of the Virtues on the font
are the work of several sculptors. Ghiberti executed the
209
14
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Baptism of Our Lord, and John before Herod ; to Dona-
tello is due the Presentation of the Baptist's Head to Herod;
the Birth and Naming of John, and his Preaching in the
Wilderness, are by the Turini ; and the Angel appearing
to Zacharias is by Della Quercia. All these groups, which
fill the panels of the hexagonal basin, were executed between
1427 and 1430.
From the centre of the basin rises a group of six marble
pillars supporting a tabernacle, featuring those Cinquecento
ciboria frequently seen over the high altars in churches. It
is of the same form, and enriched with sculptured figures
of the Virtues by the several artists just alluded to. Above,
at the angles, are six statuettes of angels, the whole ter-
minating in a figure of St John the Baptist, which, as well
as those of the five saints in marble round the tabernacle,
are Della Quercia's work. The bronze relief of the Virgin
and Child filling the door of the tabernacle, as also three of
the bronze-winged boys (or putti) on the cornice, are by the
Turini; the remaining putri being the work of Donatello.
If the evidence to the domination of ideas and of re-
ligious convictions be the best title attached to monuments
that can recommend such objects to our regard, the Cathe-
dral of Orvieto must be allowed a very high place among
the ecclesiastical edifices of Italy.
It is, in fact, the grand monumental record and expres-
sion of that dogmatic teaching as to the Holy Sacrament of
the Altar, which is distinctively Roman; and the sublime
Office for the Festival of Corpus Christi, composed by St
Thomas Aquinas, does not more expressively convey its
profound meaning, in prayer or hymn, than does this
splendid Cathedral in the various art-works adorning it
in the very fact, indeed, of its existence.
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THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
The picturesque town of Orvieto-long will three days
spent there at the All Hallows-tide of 1909 live in the
memory !--seated on a lofty plateau, surrounded by a
cincture of tufa rock, like a natural fortification, one of the
most commanding and strongest positions enjoyed by any
place in Italy, was taken by Alaric on his way to Rome, A.D.
409. Besieged and captured by Odoacer sixty-seven years
later, it was garrisoned in the sixth century by Vitiges, but
finally wrested from the Ostrogoths, and resubjected to
the Greek Empire by Belisarius in 568. After having been
for many years comprised in the kingdom founded by the
Longobard invaders, it passed into the hands of Charle-
magne, in consequence of the overthrow of that alien rule
in Northern Italy, and was comprised in the donation
made by the Frankish conquerors to the Papacy.
After that last transfer this city, however modified may
have been the forms, long retained the principles of in-
dependent government, with municipal rights and privi-
leges founded on ancient customs. In the eleventh century
Orvieto had its “Rettore," or local governor, and con-
suls, the former usually nominated by the Pope ; but these
magistrates were superseded in the thirteenth century by
the then more prevalent civic government, under a Podestà
and captain of the people-two offices held, in the first
instance, by the Bishop of this see and the Bishop of
Chiusi, with rather singular blending of sacred and political
functions.
Some writers advance that the first Pope to visit Orvieto
was John X., A.D. 916; next, Benedict VII., 977, who,
during a long sojourn here, built the palace known as
“Apostolic” for papal residence. It has often been restored,
but still retains a good mediæval character in its architec-
211
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
U
ture. About the year 1000, Sylvester II., with several
barons of the Neapolitan provinces, took refuge here dur-
ing the Greek War in Southern Italy. In 1013 Benedict
founded a college in Orvieto.
To Benedict IX., resident here in 1034, are ascribed
two of the extant churches ; and among the other Popes
who successively visited this rock-girt city, for a more or
less prolonged sojourn, we find the illustrious Gregory
VII., our countryman Adrian IV. (who did much here in
the way of public buildings and improvements *), Martin
IV., Urban IV., and lastly, the unfortunate Clement VII.,
whose flight in disguise, after the horrors and miseries of
the sack of Rome by the fierce hordes under Bourbon, and
after escaping from his own wretched captivity in the
Castle of San Angelo, forms a well-known episode in that
tragic page of sixteenth-century history.
It was during the sojourn of Urban IV. at Orvieto,
between 1262 and 1264, that a miracle was believed to
have taken place at Bolsena, a town in this diocese, which
event tradition assumes to have been the suggestive cause
that led to the erection of the superb Cathedral, now almost
the sole attraction that ever brings tourists to this quiet
city. But a learned ecclesiastic, who wrote the history of
this Cathedral—I refer to Della Valle and his Storia del
Duomo d'Orvieto, published at Rome in 1791-owns that
its origin is ascribed by some to desire, on the part of the
citizens, to do honour to the Blessed Virgin, as the Assunta
* Nicholas Breakspeare. In the compilation of ancient papal bio-
graphies found in Muratori (Rer. Ital. Script.), it is expressly stated
that our countryman was the first Pope who ever visited Orvieto ; and
that it was through his exertions this city was resubjected to the tiara,
after having been long alienated. The fullest account I can refer to of
the other papal sojourns here is in Moroni, Dizionario di Erudizione.
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THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
(i.e., in her Assumption), revered as their special patroness.
That story of the Bolsena Miracle, immortalised by Raffaele
at the Vatican, presents one of the most singular examples
of the acceptance, and intensely - felt influences in the
popular mind, of the miraculous, admitted without one of
the proofs or investigations that modern intellect would,
in every such case, demand. And the two versions of this
same story differ in many essential points ; both being
given, yet without any notice of such discrepancy, in Padre
Della Valle's learned monograph.
A German priest, troubled in conscience for having
doubted, not (it seems) the doctrine of a real but of a carnal
Presence, in the Eucharist, started for Rome with the hope
of securing the intercession of St Peter, through prayer at
his tomb, for the solving of his doubts and pardoning of
his errors. Resting one day on the shores of the beautiful
Bolsena Lake, he celebrated Mass in the Church of Sta
Christina (still seen) at the little town; and after the con-
secration, whilst holding the Sacred Host in his hands, with
mind earnestly bent, as was natural, on the mysterious
question that had induced him to undertake his pilgrimage,
beheld blood issuing from the consecrated species, and
staining the linen corporals, each stain severally assuming
the form of a human head, with features like the “ Volto
Santo,” or supposed portrait of Our Lord ! Such is one
version ; but different indeed are even certain leading de-
tails in the other-namely, that the priest let fall some
drops of consecrated wine on the corporals, and in fear,
endeavouring to conceal this by folding up the linen, found
that the liquid had passed through all the folds, leaving on
each a red stain in form of a disc, like the Sacred Host.
The rest of the story is given without discrepancies, and is
213
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
perfectly credible. Too much awe-stricken to consume the
Elements, that priest, now for ever cured of his doubts,
caused both those sacramental species to be reverentially
preserved'; proceeded to Orvieto, and threw himself at the
feet of the Pope, confessing his doubts and narrating the
miracle.
Urban IV. immediately sent the Bishop of Orvieto to
1
with all the local clergy, went in procession to meet the
returning prelate at a bridge some miles distant, and to
receive the sacred deposit from his hands. Soon afterwards,
in 1264, Urban IV. published at Orvieto the Bull command-
ing a general observance of the Corpus Christi festival,
pose the Office and hymns for that festival.
The Bolsena Miracle may have hastened, but it certainly
did not give the first suggestion for this important step
to the Pope.
Ecclesiastical decisions and popular feelings had been
long preparing the ground for this signal triumph, ex-
pressed in ritual, of the orthodox over the heterodox cause.
The first impulse had proceeded-as narrated in the
chapter on Liège in my Cathedrals and Churches of Belgium
--from no other source than the vision of a devout nun,
the Beata Giuliana, who, in 1208, believed she had re-
ceived a divine mandate to enjoin upon the Church the
observance of a new festival in honour of the Blessed
Sacrament. The Bishop of Liège and his theologians gave
earnest heed to her, and seven years later that prelate in-
stituted the Corpus Domini festival, of course for his own
diocese alone. It was not till 1252 that its observance ex-
214
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
1. Sen
-
tended further, and by the act of a Cardinal-Legate, who
ordered its adoption throughout the provinces comprised
in his jurisdiction, namely, the whole of Flanders. In
1260 the then Bishop of Liège petitioned Urban IV. to
decree the universal observance of the Corpus Domini
throughout the Catholic world ; and when we remember
the antecedents of this pontiff, we cease to be surprised
at his readiness to follow such suggestion, for it was Hugh
de Thierry, a theologian of Liège, who had advised the
former bishop in a sense favourable to Giuliana's devout
counsels, who now occupied the papal throne as Urban
IV. The Bull issued by him is said to have contained a
full narrative of the Bolsena Miracle ; but the author of
the Storia del Duomo d'Orvieto owns that neither he nor
any other who had searched the Vatican archives for it,
had succeeded in tracing it to its original source. In other
papal documents, however, the same event is more or
less fully stated, for alluded to by Clement VI. (1343),
by Gregory XI. (1377), by Callixtus III. (1456), and by
Sixtus IV. (1477); but most circumstantially by Benedict
XIV., “de Festis." In an ancient metrical life of Urban
IV., edited by Muratori, the institution of the festival
is the theme of a distinct section :
“Sic digne statuit ut in anno Corporis hujus,
Tum festum celebre fiat in orbe semel.”
.
But here we find no allusion to what had happened at
Bolsena. However the Christian feeling of the age may
have been disposed to acquiesce and to believe at the time
of Urban IV., it is remarkable that the new festival failed
to be universally adopted, or soon fell into desuetude, as
may be inferred from the fact that Durandus, in his
215
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Rationale, penned but a score or so of years after its in-
stitution, does not even allude to it. Nor is there reason
to believe that this festival, eventually celebrated with such
pomp, had taken its present place in the cycle of sacred
functions till several pontiffs had revived the ordinance
of Urban, and urgently insisted upon the Corpus Domini
festival as obligatory — Clement V., at the Council of
Vienne, in 1311, John XXII., his immediate successor,
Martin V., and Eugenius IV. in the following century.
The author of the History of Orvieto Cathedral, several
times referred to, admits that the earliest extant monu-
ment to the fact of the miracle is the splendid silver re-
liquary, that contains the Host and Corporals brought
from Bolsena, now in the chapel opening from the northern
transept in Orvieto Cathedral, being a masterpiece of
metallurgy, on which are represented in enamel all the
details of the story, and which was finished, in 1338, by
Ugolino Vieri, a Sienese artist.
An interesting though modern testimony is that of
Mgr. della Cornea, Bishop of Orvieto, who states * that he
had himself discovered the Sacred Host, not hitherto known
to be preserved in the reliquary ; that, on touching a
spring, he had caused a door to fly open, behind which
was seen the precious object deposited in a recess, with
two silver statuettes of angels kneeling and waving censers
before it. The Bishop adds the extraordinary fact, as to
which his word is our sole guarantee, that he had exposed
that thrice-sacred object to the ordeal of fire, which it had
sustained without injury.
The circumstances amidst which the citizens undertook
* Vide, the Acts of a Provincial Council held and published here in
1660.
216
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
the building of their noble Cathedral should be borne in
mind.
Throughout the thirteenth century Orvieto was the
theatre of intestine wars; the Guelph and Ghibelline parties,
headed by two powerful families, were preying upon each
other, and making victims of the defenceless, of all those
worsted in their fratricidal strife. In 1286, the Filippeschi,
at the head of the Ghibellines, obtained the upper hand,
expelled all the Guelphs from these walls, and wreaked.
their vengeance against that adverse party by slaughter,
incendiarism and the demolition of towers and castles. In
the decisive battle of Montaperti, 1260, when the Floren-
tine Guelphs suffered signal defeat from the allied Ghibel-
lines of other Tuscan cities, so many “ Orvietani” fell on
the losing side that, as Sismondi says, their city was left
almost deserted in consequence. It needed no small amount
of energy and religious zeal to commence, under such
pressure of disaster and civil war, one of the most splendid:
sanctuaries ever raised for Christian worship.
The undertaking was resolved upon and voted for by
the municipal council, in or shortly after 1284; and it
seems that the works were begun in 1288, when was formed
a loggia artistica, or committee of works, with a residence,
casa dell opera, near the site chosen. All designs and models
had to be submitted to the officials of the loggia, in order to
be examined and approved, or otherwise, by the camerlingo
and his assessors. The extant documents from the archives.
of the committee range over dates from 1310 to 1631.
Neither popular devotion nor national munificence failed
to bring in contributions. In 1298, the oblations amounted
to more than 3362 lire ; in 1326, to 7836 lire-large
sums, considering the relative value of money in those:
217
· THE CATHEDRALS OF "CENTRAL ITALY
times. In 1344, Pope Clement VI. granted an indulgence
to all who should visit Orvieto for devotional purposes,
which spiritual favours were doubled in an indulgence from
Gregory IX., obtainable by all who should assist in the
works for the new Cathedral. Then were seen citizens of
all classes co-operating, besides multitudes of pilgrims,
who, after assisting at religious services, would spend the
rest of the day in doing what they could to help the
masons, stonecutters, or other artisans at the sacred build-
ing. Persons of good condition, in numbers, brought bur-
work would bring drink or food to the labourers, enabling
them thus to refresh themselves without leaving the spot.
It is one of the proofs how utterly were all Sabbatarian
notions foreign to the mediæval mind, even while religious
influences were at the greatest height, that Sundays and
other festivals were marked by special activity (in the hour,
that is, after the principal rites were over) during the pro-
gress of these works at Orvieto. *
The tradition, perpetuated by guide-books, that assumes
the architecture to have been originally designed by Lor-
enzo Maitani of Siena, is untenable. It was not till 1310
that that artist was invited from his native place to accept
the post of maestro de maestri for this Cathedral building,
and became resident in Orvieto, as he did, with the slender
salary of twelve gold florins per annum. Two of his designs
for the façade-neither, however, exactly carried out in the
edifice now before us—are preserved in the casa dell opera.
In 1298, the Cathedral had made such progress that, on
ann
* Similar circumstances attended the reconstruction of Chartres
Cathedral after the fire of 1194.
218
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
visit to this city, celebrated Mass on a portable altar within
the unfinished walls. In 1321 the whole was roofed over
with fir-beams, richly adorned with intaglio, and probably
with painting also; soon after which the Middle Pointed
Gothic windows were filled with diaphanous alabaster-a
beautiful substitute for glass, still in part retained in those
lighting the west end and aisles of the nave. In 1388 a
fine organ, ordered from an Augustinian monk, a German,
famous for his manufacture of such instruments, was com-
pleted. Previously, a factory, with furnaces and so forth,
for the preparation of mosaics, early introduced among the
decorations of the façade, was established in the city, a
general restoration of all which art-works was undertaken
during the first decade of the seventeenth century. Finally,
this glorious church was consecrated by the Cardinal-Bishop
of the see, 13th November 1677.
To proceed to details.
The peculiar arrangement of the plan of Orvieto Cathe-
dral perhaps bears testimony to the eager determination
to have a Cathedral as quickly as possible after the ambiti-
ous idea first dawned on the Orvietani. The church was
thrust in as space could be found for it at the moment,
and squeezed in to fit the lines of the available site; the
two transepts, one narrower than the other, taking an
oblique line; the left-hand transept (looking from the
nave) sloping off at an angle towards the choir, and the
crossing arch being carried obliquely across the end of the
nave. To approach this difficulty conveniently, the columns
of the northern nave arcade, in the last two or three bays,
are slightly advanced, so as to lead up gradually to the
skew portion of the crossway arch.
The succession of five small apses along either side of
219
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the nave is a peculiarity of the plan, especially in the way
they are arranged, not centrally with each of the six bays,
but so that one jamb of each apse faces a pier of the arcade,
and the other the centre of the bay. The reason for this
very unarchitectural arrangement does not seem very clear.
rococo altars and altar-pieces, all of which have been swept
away in the late restoration of the fabric, but at present
they are perfectly empty. Much ancient fresco-painting has
been brought to light, and the decoration of one chapel has
been executed as a trial for the rest, but it must be confessed
that the result is by no means satisfactory. For the back-
grounds to the altars which, it is to be presumed, are to be
placed in these semicircular recesses, one would feel inclined
to suggest dorsals and side-curtains of rich stuffs, the intro-
duction of which would do much to relieve the náve of that
cold, unfurnished appearance it wears at present, but, un-
fortunately, the cheapness and accessibility of marbles will
effectually preclude anything of the kind being attempted.
The body of the church is divided into a nave, with very
lofty lean-to aisles and a clerestory of equally imposing
dimensions ; transepts, not projecting beyond the line of
the aisles, but lengthened on the ground plan by means of
low chapels ; and a short square-ended choir. There is no
steeple, nor does there seem to be any provision for one,
the bells being hung in a quadrilateral belfry, built upon
the north wall of the choir. Although this belfry seems to
belong to the post-Gothic period, it is an undeniably pictur-
esque composition—narrow, flat-topped, without a cross
or any other appendage, and pierced with two rows of four
round-headed openings, of which the upper ones are fur-
nished with bells. There is a similar but somewhat more
220
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
O
ornate belfry at the Franciscan Church, a little to the west
of the Cathedral, of the same date apparently, and crowned
with a sort of tall triangular fléche of iron, remarkably
picturesque in contour.
The fenestration of Orvieto Cathedral is, on the whole,
very fine. Beginning at the east end, we have a very tall,
narrow window of only four lights. The two subarcuations
are very stilted, enclosing as they do not only the two
trefoiled lights but tracery in the shape of three trefoils.
In the head of the window, and supported by the points
of the two subsidiary compartments, is a large circle filled
with geometrical tracery of a somewhat complex character,
but which, after a little study, resolves itselfinto five spheri-
cal triangles, foliated and grouped around a cinquefoil.
The glass in this window is modern, and represents, in
forty-four small oblong compartments, as many scenes from
the lives of Our Lord and the Virgin Mary, on grounds
alternately ruby and blue. For the great width of the choir
this east window of Orvieto Cathedral looks too narrow,
but, as we know, windows in the Italian Gothic churches
are never very large, one of the most imposingly dimen-
sioned that I can call to mind being at the east end of the
Dominican Church at Perugia. The wall space on either
side is entirely covered with frescoes, * now much faded,
by Ilario, and six other assistants, representing, together
with those on the side walls and the vaulting, the Legend
of Joachim and Anna, the Life and Assumption of the
Blessed Virgin, the Apostles, each with a clause of the
Credo, doctors, and pontiffs.
* Upon these frescoes and others which adorn the two chapels open-
ing from the transepts, I have dwelt at some length in the first chapter
on the “Arts Auxiliary to Architecture.”
221
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
In the north and south walls of this short eastern limb,
which is quadripartitely vaulted, are rather large, round
windows, very deeply splayed inside with a succession of
simple mouldings, and enclosing tracery, composed of seven
quatrefoiled circles, enriched with modern stained glass of
excellent character. The subjects here are half figures on
ruby or blue grounds. There are similar windows in the
transepts which, like the choir and the crossing, are groined.
In the clerestory of the nave there are six tall, incipi.
ently traceried lancets, glazed with white glass in very small
round quarries ; and in the aisles, between the little apses,
are two-light windows, with quatrefoils in their heads.
These windows are filled half with stained glass and half
with translucent alabaster, which, as may be supposed, sheds
a curious amber-coloured light on the surrounding archi-
tecture. The windows above the western doors are com-
pletely filled with this material, which I met subsequently
in San Miniato at Florence and elsewhere. The upper half
of the lights and the tracery contain modern stained glass
of much richness and brilliancy of tincture, uniform in de-
sign, and representing single figures under canopies. In
the quatrefoil of each window is a half figure.
All these windows on the north and south sides of the
1
and are placed high up in the walls. Their dripstones are
prolonged to meet the short strip of string-course, which,
in continuation of the abaci of the capitals to these jamb-
shafts, relieves the walls between the windows and the
apses. The moulding of this string-course and of the shafts
and arches at the entrances of the apses assumes a rope-like
character.
Very noble indeed is the series of columns carrying the
222
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
arches between the nave and its aisles. * They are, with two
exceptions, circular, tall, and built up of dark and light
stone in alternately regular courses.
Their capitals exhibit a variety of foliaged ornament, as
bold yet graceful in conception as it is vigorous in execu-
tion. Some of the capitals have octagonal abaci, some square,
others circular, but no regular order is observable. The
bases are low ; round in some cases, octagonal in others,
and some are enriched at the angles with tongues of leafage.
пеа
C
dark and light material, as are the spandrels and the clere..
story walls. In front of the latter is a continuous narrow
passage, defended by a pierced parapet, and returned across
the west end, where it assumes the form of a covered
gallery, the parapet being surmounted by a series of tri-
foliated arcades supporting a lean-to roof-a very pictur-
esque arrangement.
Above this gallery is seen the rose-window of the façade,
and over the western doorway a round-headed one, com-
posed of six lights, with intersecting tracery uncusped and
filled with translucent alabaster, as are the similarly out-
lined windows over the doors at the western extremities
of the aisles.
are banded with iron hoops, and in a few instances may be
seen a small bracket fixed to these columns towards their
summits. The respond or half-pier at the east end of the
arcade on either side should be especially noticed, for the
beauty of its detail, its corners being enriched from top
* The width of the nave of Orvieto Cathedral, from column to columna
arcades are each 26 feet in width.
223
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
to bottom with a continuous line of leafage, carved either
on which each piece is imposed, the light being admirably
contrasted with the dark. These vertical strips of foliaged
ornament are beyond question the most engaging pieces of
detail presented by this glorious Duomo at Orvieto. The
wooden roof of the nave is supposed to date from the
first ten years of the fourteenth century-though at an
early period of its existence it evidently was not in a very
solid condition, as from a document of 1416, we learn that
an artisan, named Marretta, had been entrusted with the
reconstruction of it. When the work of restoration was
commenced in 1881, the old tie-beams were found com-
pletely out of order, but after considerable difficulties and
delays, the work of demolition and rebuilding proceeded
with regularity up to October 1886, when the wood-
work was finished, and followed up by its decoration,
which was also satisfactorily concluded shortly afterwards,
and now the roof of Orvieto Cathedral professes to be a re-
production of the original work as it was before its decay.*
Signor Zampi, under whose direction this important
undertaking was carried out, is generally acknowledged to
have performed his task with skill and accuracy. The only
one occasion when he departed from the original work was
in lining with copper the upper surface of the cornices and
replacing the terra-cotta tubes between the small columns
by copper tubing, to carry off the water from the walls.
Within the westernmost bay on the north side of the
nave stands the font, a most wonderful admixture of white
* There are no signs anywhere of an intention to give the nave of
vaulting over such a long broad space.
224
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
and chocolate-coloured marble. * The font itself is a very
large octagon of the latter coloured marble, with curved
sides, and rests upon a base of the same shape, which, in
its turn, is supported by couchant lions. Part of this base
assumes the character of a carved frieze ; this is of white
marble, as is the octagonal canopy fashioned in the sem-
blance of a Baptistery, having doors on each of its four
cardinal, but rather low, sides, and a tall spiral roof, flattened
at the top to receive the pedestal for a statue of St John
the Baptist.; the ribs between its eight sides are crocketed
from top to bottom. The doors aforementioned have
pointed arches trifoliated, and are surmounted by straight-
sided gables, also profusely crocketed, and flanked by pin-
nacled turrets. The eight sides of the spiral canopy are
unrelieved by any ornament.
Among the rich profusion of art-works and several
creditable monuments of the Earlier Renaissance epoch
which claim attention after the visitor has grasped the main
features of this grand Duomo, are a mosaic pavement of
the most beautiful and varied patterns, extending to a
length of about 18 feet from the steps leading up into the
sanctuary ; the iron grilles at the eastern end of either nave
aisle, and those enclosing the transeptal chapels; the
round arches opening into these chapels and supported
upon graceful clusters of shafts, with exquisitely sculptured
capitals; the variety of foliaged ornament in the jambs of
the small portals on either side of the nave, and the small
sculptured groups-originally perhaps of bronze but now
a vivid green ; and the numerous remains of painting in a
more or less perfect state of preservation, on the walls of
the nave aisles and the succession of apses.
* See illustration, p. 174.
mere DUS ra
ia
225
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
The church seems to have been in a very neglected state
in the early part of the last century, for when MM.
Benois, Resanoff, and Krakan, the three Russian architects
who have produced one of the best monographs on the
building, first visited it in 1842, the interior was covered
with so thick a layer of dust, that the frescoes and decora-
tions could not be seen. They therefore obtained leave to
wash it down with clean water ; indeed, it would be as well
if all “restoration” operations were of as harmless and
beneficial a nature as this.
A less well-directed enthusiasm in the sixteenth century,
still in the desire for what at that time was supposed to be
artistic perfection, would have led to the recasing of the
whole church with a Renaissance overlay, but fortunately
this was not carried far enough to obliterate all the original
work.
It was intended to introduce Ionic columns into the piers
of the aisles, to turn the Pointed windows into rectangular
openings, and to decorate the apsidal chapels with marble,
but on account of the cost, stucco was used instead. The
would-be perpetrator of these enormities was one Scalza
(an Orvietan, 1532-1617), who has, however, left a fine
specimen of his talent in the splendid organ-case which
occupies the wall of the north transept, above the entrance
to the chapel containing the Bolsena shrine, besides more
questionable ones in several statues.*
In the Museo dell Opera there is the plan for the trans-
was
* One must exempt from condemnation a “ Pieta" group, and
statues of St Sebastian and St Matthew, forming portions of side altar-
pieces. The figure of St Matthew, a finely expressive one, is Scalza's
own portrait. This sculptor was one of those truly great masters only to
be appreciated in the works bequeathed to their native cities.
226
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
formation of the church, together with a design of a cam-
panile by Scalza himself, which is not without a certain
grandeur of style. The chapels were “adorned” with stucco-
work and painted decorations from the designs of Scalza
and of Raffaelo de Montelupo, but fortunately nothing
more was attempted.
In 1537 the magnificent series of stalls, of which I
hope to give some description in a future volume, had
been removed to the choir, when the rites of Rome had
become general in the churches of the vicinity of the
Eternal City. It was Paul III. who ordered their trans-
ference and the crypt to be closed.
If Orvieto Cathedral be surpassed by other examples of
the Italian Gothic in the completeness of art-presentment
or general harmony of effect, its façade stands unrivalled,
a sun amidst minor luminaries. No description could do
justice to that pomp of beauty, that concentrated resplen-
dence of art in its several forms—the noble offering of
man's genius, skill and labour, strained to the utmost
during successive ages to glorify the Almighty in this
wondrous structure.
Most celebrated among ornaments contributed by Italian
schools of different periods to this façade are the bas-reliefs
distributed over the four spaces between and on either
side of the three great portals—complicated compositions
in pale yellow marble, with numerous figures on a small
scale, as to whose origin critics have held various opinions.
Marchese, in his History of Dominican Artists, supposes
the greater number to be by Guglielmo Agnelli, a Dom-
inican lay-brother, the pupil of Niccola Pisano, and who
is known to have been engaged at Orvieto some time
before 1304. But it is certain that several sculptors worked
227
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
here, and the generally-received view ascribes those reliefs,
respectively, to Arnolfo of Florence, Agnolo and Goro di
Gregorio. The statue of the Madonna and Child, seated
under a pavilion above the central doorway, is ascribed
to Andrea Pisano ; the twelve prophets, statues in niches,
lateral to the great round window, to Agostino and Agnolo;
the apostles, above the same window, to later and inferior
artists.
Days, weeks, months, might be spent in studying the
exquisitely elaborated reliefs among the most precious
works of the fourteenth century that adorn the flat pilasters
in the basement of the façade. These may be divided into
three principal series or sacred cycles : the Creation, the
Prophecies, the Gospel, the Resurrection and Doom ;
or, as designated by Perkins in his Tuscan Sculptors,
Creation, Prophecy, Fulfilment and Judgment. In 1370,
no fewer than fifteen sculptors and nine wood-carvers and
joiners, with eight assistants, were engaged here. Begin-
ning with the most beautiful, the Creation, comprising the
story of Adam and Eve in Paradise, and after the Fall, till
the death of Abel, we observe the leading idea, now be-
coming dominant in art, which identifies the Divine Son
with the Divine Father, and contemplates in the Creator
the Saviour, here distinguished by the recognised type of
benign beauty accepted by almost all art traditions for the
person of the Incarnate Son. We remark also the con-
spicuous place assigned in these sculptures to angelic
beings as spectators, attendant at every act of Deity in
relation to man; nor could any forms be more lovely or
solemn than those winged angels, floating in graceful move-
ment, with an expression of tender or most mournful
earnestness, as if in profound pitying presentiment of all
228
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
the woes in store for the descendants, down to the final
consecration of those exiles from Paradise.
The conception of the Prophecy series (as it may be
styled) is singularly imaginative. At the basement level
we see Abraham réclining on a hillside and gazing up to
the future, represented by many figures above, the heroes
and events of Old Testament history--kings and judges,
Deborah and Judith, the Acts of Moses, the Vision of
besides which, to complete the cycle of prophetic vision
seen by the patriarch, his own tomb, an open coffin, con-
taining the skeleton of Abraham, is exposed to view, and
at the highest level the New succeeding to the Old Cove-
nant, here represented by three subjects alone : the Angel
appearing to Zacharias, the Crucifixion and the Majesty.
In the Gospel series we discern many fine compositions.
At the basement level is a figure reclining like that of
Abraham, and alike looking up into the future—this being
Jacob, above whom are represented scenes in Gospel
history, from the Annunciation to the appearance of Our
Lord to St Mary Magdalene after His Resurrection,
laterally the twelve prophets, whose figures bound the
groups on each side.
The complicated series illustrating the Resurrection and
Vasari, Lanzi and Agincourt attribute these reliefs to
Niccola Pisano; Cicognara and Luzi to Giovanni Pisano.
Here, as in Michael Angelo's famous picture, the element
of horror predominates.
There is, indeed, much grace in several among the
features of the blessed, but the ghastly varieties of anguish
and punishment, the fantastic forms of the Divine tor-
229
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
na
On
mentors, make such impression, that the beautiful is
eclipsed by the terrible, the graceful by the grotesque.
Even the figure of the Redeemer within an elliptic
nimbus at the highest level is deficient in the conspicuous
majesty that the subject requires. In one detail, however,
we see progress of ideas--namely, the absence of mon-
strosity from the figure of Satan which, though entwined
by huge serpents, is strictly human. This is certainly a
finer conception than that we see in Niccola Pisano's reliefs
on the pulpit in Siena Cathedral, where the Evil One is
a monstrous cross between the human and the bestial.
The mosaics on this façade are of unequal merit, but in
general effect rich and harmonious. As now before us,
they are mostly restorations, carried on by the Papal
Government, and subsequently by the State.
The finest early compositions are—the Assumption,
with date 1366, and the name inscribed “ Joannes,” prob-
ably Giovanni Leonardelli, a friar, whose engagements
here are known from the archives ; and the figures of
Isaiah and Nahum, with date 1355. The Baptism of our
Lord, by Nebbia, with the figures designed by the sculptor,
Scalza, appears to have been completed in 1581. The
Coronation of the Virgin, on the highest of the three
gables, is by the Roman mosaicists, Cocchi and Castellani ;
a copy, finished in 1838 from a picture by the Sienese
artist, Sano di Pietro (c. 1449). The vicissitudes of this
last mosaic adorning the most conspicuous surface, are
singularly relevant to the history of religious tendencies.
Originally it was not the Coronation of the Virgin, but the
Resurrection of our Lord that occupied this distinguished
position. In 1714 that earlier work was removed, and an-
other substituted, the Assumption, from an indifferent
1
230
THE GOTHIC: ORVIETO
was
picture by Lanfranco; but at last, with better taste, in-
deed, the mosaic from the picture by the eminently
devotional Sienese artist, above referred to, was raised
into the place, where it now strikingly announces the
intent to glorify the Blessed Virgin.
Never can I forget one view I enjoyed of the façade of
Orvieto Cathedral under peculiarly favourable effects. It
was on All Saints' Day, 1909, after solemn Vespers, and
there, bathed in the crimson glow of an autumnal sunset,
the glorious façade, its marbles and pinnacles, mosaics and
sculptures, glittered like gems; and the whole seemed a
thing that might be likened to a splendid but mysterious
shrine, gleaming in solitude under the eye of God.
In the Chapel of the Santissimo Corporale, which forms
an extension of the north transept, stands, above the altar,
that precious silver reliquary, containing the consecrated
Host and other objects brought from Bolsena; its weight
in solid silver being 400 lbs., its measurement, in metres,
1.39 by 0.63. Its front is intended to represent that of
the Cathedral; and besides the recess containing the relics,
are twelve enamel miniatures, illustrating the whole of that
famous miracle, also the Last Supper and the Passion-
the former series being cited by Della Valle as the earliest
authentic record (1338) of the supposed supernatural fact.
On one of the Gothic tympana of this reliquary is the
figure of the Saviour, with sceptre and globe, and also
with the unusual attribute of wings, said to be suggested
by the designation of the Messiah, “ Angel of the Cove-
nant” in the prophecies of Malachi.
The writer of Mr Murray's excellent hand-book to
Central Italy--but who, by the way, omits to mention
the curious orange-yellow, translucent alabaster from the
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
East, in the windows of the façade and nave aisles, * and
is unreasonably severe with the modern stained glass which
fills the upper half of the latter--informs us that the
casket in which the reliquary is kept, is closed by four
keys, one of which is in the custody of the Bishop, an-
other in that of the Chapter, a third in the hands of the
Senate, while a fourth is at Rome. It is therefore impossible,
under ordinary circumstances, to have it opened, except at
Easter and at Corpus Christi. On the latter festival the
reliquary is solemnly borne to the high altar at three
o'clock in the morning, and remains there all day. At
seven o'clock there is Pontifical High Mass, after which
the relic is carried in procession through the city.
* It is used in Tarragona Cathedral.
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-
CHAPTER VI
The Gothic-II. Assisi and Arezzo
TORTY-SEVEN years ago English art lost its most
T distinguished ornament in the early death of William
Dyce. He was pre-eminently an artist in the highest and
art, and applied it to every department of human know-
ledge. Art was to him a living principle, an energy; and
in the true he recognised abstract beauty, and in beauty
and order the highest and sovereign truth. It argues an
inadequate and incomplete notion of the function of art to
restrict it to the subordinate practice of sculpture, paint-
ing or music. Leonardo is, perhaps, the solitary instance
in modern times and in extant biography who recognised
the manifold and imperial function of art. Dyce received
a classical education, and he is a rare specimen of a Scotch
academician who has pursued art in a platonic and ideal
spirit. An artist by natural gifts, he was pre-eminently an
educated and academic artist, not so much fettered by the
traditions of the technical schools as learned in the higher
philosophy of cultivated taste. Raffaele, Michael Angelo,
Leonardo, Fra Angelico, were all educated men. Correggio
Italians? It seems to require a high education—at least in
theselater generations——to makea complete artist. The inner
soul of design cannot be grasped without a sense of the
abstract nature of proportion. Dyce was a musician, and
Leonardo was a poet; so was Michael Angelo; so was that
gifted architect, the late G. F. Bodley. To apprehend the
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
subtler beauties of colour requires a poetical faculty. Turner
and Blake were both poets-of a strange and perplexing
cast, it is true; so that it seems to follow that the blind
man who thought scarlet was as the sound of the trumpet,
apprehended that mysterious law which connected sound
and colour. It may be doubted whether Dyce could have
been the colourist he was, had he not exhibited the inner
feeling either in music or poetry, as well as on the canvas.
It has been said of William Dyce that he could turn
from his easel to the Summa of Thomas Aquinas. But he
was not a pedant in theology or painting. If he was not
one of the originators of pre-Raffaelitism, he was at once
open to its influences; and though his early works dis-
played something of the conventionalism of the art schools
of the times in which his lot was cast, he swiftly and
safely imbibed the teaching which sent him to Nature for
truth, not only of form, but of detail. Here, however, his
educated mind stood him in good stead. In the way of
ornament, for example, he knew that all mediæyal form
art, but he went to the great originals, and pursued them
through their mediæval corruptions back to the common
nature from which Greece derived its inspirations. He
was equally fair to Greek form and mediæval feeling. In the
House of Lords his draperies are as pure as those of
Phidias, while his feeling is as reverent as that of Perugino.
His greatest, because his most complete work was the
Nativity, Crucifixion, and Twelve Apostles, surmounted
by the Majesty, with which he decorated the eastern wall
of Butterfield's sumptuous chef-d'æuvre, All Saints, Mar-
garet Street. I say was, because, these works having been
234
THE GOTHIC
found no longer susceptible to another restoration, they
are being, at the moment of writing, covered over by
copies from another hand, so that it is impossible now,
for unborn generations to admire a principle of design,
colour and sentiment which gives Dyce rank among the
highest of the best Italian school.
When Dyce was a very young man-it was on the 24th
of May 1844—he delivered an introductory lecture in
the Classical Theatre of King's College, London, on “The
Theory of the Fine Arts.” At that time it was a bold thing
for a young professor to come forward in his lecture-room
to proclaim the great truth that “Christian Art so far
agrees with the Classical, that it takes Nature for its guide
and model, but it exercises itself on types altogether
different, and has for its drift to interest the moral senti-
ments, rather than to charm or flatter the senses.”
To an ecclesiologist it is not a little gratifying to find
in the same lecture that of all branches of Christian art,
the one which Dyce, distinguished even then as a painter
and a musician, chose as the most apposite for his purpose
of didactic illustration, was architecture. Such a testimony,
coming from so unprejudiced an authority, was extremely
valuable. In the latter part of his lecture, while repudiat-
ing, on behalf of all Christian art, the gross and vulgar
notion of their being physical sciences, Dyce vindicated
for them the higher honour of being moral sciences,
observing that "if architecture's elevation to this higher
sphere deprives it of the kind of certainty which belongs.
to the demonstrations of physics and mathematics, all
that can be said is, that it shares the difficulty which in-
vests every question of a moral nature.”
Dyce divided Christian art into five epochs, or schools,
235
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
which he designated respectively, Christian-Pagan, Bar-
baric, Ascetic, Pagan-Christian and Sensual. These terms
are so self-explanatory, that did I perfectly agree to their
truth, I should offer no remark upon them. A strong
objection, however, must be taken to the apparently con-
temptuous name, Barbaric, under which class I presume
the professor included inter alia those glorious monuments
of Mediæval Europe, Durham and the two great abbey
churches at Caen ; Mayence, Worms, Gernrode, Paulin-
zelle, and other great German Romanesque basilicas ; San
Ambrogio at Milan, San Michele at Pavia, the Cathedrals
of Parma and Piacenza, and the two marvellous churches
at Toscanella, and I trust that the emendation which I
shall venture to offer is one that will meet with the appro-
bation of my readers. I propose transferring the name
Ascetic to that epoch which Dyce designated as Barbaric,
and entitling his Ascetic School, Spiritual, thereby intro-
ducing as the formal appellation of the most perfect age
of Christian art that word which the professor himself
employed to embody its distinguishing characteristic as
compared with Paganism, and affording the most marked
contrast to their own designation of the latest school.
There is, in truth, whether we regard the word in its
original or its later colouring, something extremely as-
cetic in Romanesque architecture, something in its gloomy
yet beautiful and impressive majesty, in its huge columns,
“massy proof,” speaking of “rocky solidity and indeter-
minate duration”; its long dark aisles, now silent as
Sinai's rocks, now bright and vocal with a long procession
of Christian priests and choristers, most fitly typical of
the stern and long-enduring struggles of a Christian soul
after perfection, its contests with foes, visible and invisible;
as-
7
236
THE GOTHIC
1
its fasts, and tears, and vigils, and enlivening rays of
heavenly light; while in the angelic consummation of
Christian art, pointed architecture in the aspiring vaults
of Westminster and Cologne, of Rheims and Amiens, of
Lucca and Assisi, we behold the embodied symbol of that
most glorious reality of our most Holy Faith, the saintly
spirit, treading the world, the flesh and the devil under
foot, rich in heroic virtue, and still on earth, still dwelling
among the sons of men, appearing a denizen of other
realms, a citizen of the Holy Church Triumphant, at
whose resplendent portals
Margaritis emicant i
Patentque cunctis ostia ;
Virtute namque præviâ
Mortalis illic ducitur,
Amore Christi percitus
Tormenta quisquis sustinet.
In the whole history of art, is there a more interesting
chapter than the gradual development, by repeated changes
and modifications, of the circular Roman and Byzantine
buildings, through the simple Romanesque apse into the
intricate and beautiful Gothic chevet of the French churches
in its complete form ?-a development which was gradual
only in the sense that we can trace all the steps by which
it proceeded, but which, as compared with the slow and
patient development of Egyptian and Greek art, astonishes
us by the rapidity of its proceedings, the fertility of
imagination shown by those who conducted it, and the
vast and complete change in all architectural forms which
in a few years was achieved. In every part of the world,
not only the student but the amateur of ecclesiastical
architecture, who keeps his eyes open, finds, on all sides,
237
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
works which speak to him more forcibly, the more he
examines them, of the great and eternal lesson of ecclesi-
astical architecture and art. It does not lie in the power
of every traveller to appreciate to the full these “dim
and mighty minsters of old time”; but it is in the power
of even the least observant, and the least gifted, by
cultivating their reverence for the ways and work of great
architects and artists, to make it impossible that they
should not be able to discriminate between the true and
the false, the simple and the sublime.
Consider what a glorious inheritance the enthusiastic
admirer of Christian art has ! He may not, from various
circumstances, be able to travel on the Continent, and to
see its magnificent monuments with his own eyes. But
books have been written upon them by architects, and
with an equally keen relish by the non-professional man.
Most of them are accessible, and their illustrations,
whether in engraving or photography, present a series
.
Even if circumstances compel us to limit our studies to
suppose the man has not yet lived who has seen all that
is worth seeing, even of English architecture; and as much
may often be learnt by the patient study of small works
as by more ambitious attempts to study, to group, and to
analyse the origin, principles and developments of the art
all over the civilised world.
The town of Assisi is about a mile and a half from the
railway station, and the view of it, as I approached it on the
box-seat of the omnibus belonging to the excellent Hotel
Leone, was very engaging, for besidesits natural advantages
of site, its towers and battlements, its pretty little gabled
238
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
e
a
V
belfries, its aqueduct and ruined citadel, make up a picture
in themselves. The square-topped campanile of San Fran-
cesco to the extreme left, and those of Sta Chiara, the
Duomo, and one or two other churches in the middle and
to the right of the picture, compose a very fine archi-
tectural ensemble.
Entering the town, after winding about the declivity on
which it is built, there is nothing that disappoints the ex-
pectation or breaks the spell of old enchantment which
hangs over it. The streets are for the most part silent,
narrow and steep; the architectural forms, solemn and
mediæval. The rushing and roaring stream of the present
has never flowed through this Pompeii of the thirteenth
century. The six centuries that have swept over it have
hardly brushed it with their wings. The whole scene indeed
seems prepared for the entrance of St Francis himself, with
his brown woollen robe and girdle of hemp, upon the stage.
Assisi, far more than Perugia, is stamped with the image
and superscription of one man. The forms of the landscape,
the mountains and the valleys, the woods and the rocks,
the streets and the houses, are all vocal with the name of
St Francis, that extraordinary man whose life and career
for admiration.
From the fact that Italy preceded England so much in
the march of civilisation and refinement, it happens that
the men and the events of Italian history appear nearer
than those of England. It has always seemed strange to me
that Raffaele was born about the time of Bosworth Field.
Fitness and proportion would seem to make him a con-
temporary of Milton. When we read of the taste and
239
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
difficult to believe that the best blood in England were then
dining at ten; that their dinners were composed of huge
masses of fresh and salt meat, spread upon a great oaken
table; that their food was shovelled into the mouth without
the help of a fork; that the floor of their dining-halls was
strewed with rushes, among which their dogs searched and
fought for bones; and that, in the intervals of feasting, their
minds were recreated with the postures of tumblers and
the coarse jokes of licensed jesters. St Francis was born in
1 182, about the time that our Henry II. was mourning
over first, the ingratitude and then the death of his eldest
son, Prince Henry. But when we go to Assisi and see and
feel how every spot in the landscape is identified with the
saint, and recalls his presence, it is difficult to believe that
a chasm of more than six centuries is opened between us
and him. It is not easy to find anywhere, in any country,
an historical personage of such fresh and enduring vitality.
When we think of Richard Cæur de Lion and Thomas à
Becket, they seem, by comparison, to recede far back into
the night of time. They are dim shadows, but St Francis is
a living presence, whose name is carved upon the rocks and
whispered by the winds and waters. This is one proof, and
only one among many,of the enduring character of religious
impressions, and that the most lasting conquests are won
by those who fight with spiritual weapons against spiritual
foes.
On the brow of a long declivity, then, lies Assisi, pre-
senting with its ruined citadel, and the massive abutments
of the convent, something of the appearance of a huge
fortress at a distance.
Dante has celebrated its picturesque beauty, the glory
which encircles it as the scene of St Francis' pious labours,
240
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
and the sanctuary of the early Italian art which sought to
immortalise these labours :-
“Between Turpino and the wave that falls
From blest Ubaldo's chosen hill, there hangs
Rich slope of mountains high, whence heat and cold
Are wafted through Perugia's eastern gate.
Upon that side
Where it doth break its steepness most, arose
A sun upon this world as duly this
From Ganges doth; therefore let none who speak
Of that place, say Assisi-or its name
Were lamely so delivered. But the East,
To call things rightly, be it henceforth styled.”
There are really three churches attached to the convent
at Assisi,rising one above the other, or at least three sanctu-
aries within the great edifice-one of the rare specimens of
Gothic in Italy.
The Upper Sanctuary or Church contains the frescoes of
Cimabue, illustrative of the life of Christ and that of St
Francis as His imitator. In the Second or Middle Church,
besides the masterpieces of Giotto around the high altar,
there are various pictures of Giotto's pupils, especially a
celebrated Crucifixion by Cavallini, said to have excited the
admiration of Michael Angelo for its grandeur ; and what
struck me more than all the others, a St Francis receiving
the Stigmata, attributed to Puccio Campana, also a scholar
of Giotto, although one would fain recognise the hand of
the master himself in it. In the under church of all, hollowed
in a rock, is the tomb of the saint. It is singular enough,
that while it was the first successor of St Francis in the
government of his order by whom this magnificent edifice
was reared, for the express purpose of enclosing the remains
1
241
16
of the saint, it continued for ages to be a vehement contro-
versy among the members of the order whether the remains
were really deposited there. Great doubt prevailed on the
subject, and it was only during the last century, after five
all doubt has died down. It is stated that an investigation
in 1818, conducted by the General of the Franciscans, and
authorised by Pope Pius VII., led to the discovery of the
skeleton of the saint in a stone coffin. A congregation of
cardinals confirmed the genuineness of this discovery, which
was announced by Pius VII. to the Church, and all sceptics
on the subject were henceforth threatened with excom-
munication. The necessity of strengthening the alleged
discovery by infallible sanction and a decree of excom-
munication is not a likely way of quieting doubts in some
minds; but it must be allowed that the authenticity of the
shrine of St Francis is at any rate as well established as most
shrines in Italy. The reverent Franciscan as he approaches
the dimly-lighted urn of travertine within the sacred en-
closure at Assisi, may at least feel with confidence that the
relics of the saint were native to the earth on which he
kneels. Even the Anglo-Catholic, as he stands silent by the
kneeling custode, is not here pained by any manifest lie in-
viting his regard.
The dust of St Francis may be there or not. This is to
him a small matter, but it was here at any rate, in this town
and near this place, that the humility, patience, gentleness,
and unceasing self-denial of a devoted Christian life were
exhibited and set before others as a light shining in a
dark place.
The church and convent of the order of Sti Apostoli at
Assisi stand at one extremity of the town, and form a most
242
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
imposing group of pale-brown stone buildings, in which the
pointed arches of the Gothic are blended very harmoniously
with the massive square campanile reared in the angle
formed by the north transept with the nave. The general
aspect of this group of buildings resembles a fortress rather
than a church.
The Church of San Andrea at Vercelli, in Piedmont, was
built, according to the tradition, byan Englisharchitect. * It
is difficult to believe this, though, undoubtedly, its details
suggest a foreign hand, and are admirably good. The de-
tail of the clustered columns, with their capitals and bases,
of the groining, of the windows, is all completely French
work, and excellent, and the triplet of lancets lighting the
extremity of the square-ended choir is very suggestive of
England. It is only on the exterior of Vercelli, in fact, that
any Italian character is given to the design; but even here
there is far more attempt than is usually made to secure
a picturesque tout ensemble. Its builder was a Cardinal Guela,
who had been for some years Legate in England; he erected
this church on his return, having evidently a wish to emu-
late some of the work he had learnt to admire in England
and France.
Even more remarkable is San Francesco at Assisi. Here
the architect is said to have been a German; but the evi-
dence of the mouldings is, on the whole, more in favour
of his having been a Frenchman. The singular fact how-
ever is, that, as at Vercelli, this influence did not affect
the exterior, which is designed completely in the local
style. The treatment of the vaulting in the apse of the
Upper Church, and in those of the chapels opening from
the sides of the lower one, together with their acutely-
* Vide my Cathedrals and Churches of Northern Italy.
243
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
pointed two-light windows, traceried with a foliated circle,
struck me as among the most felicitous and beautiful works
of their age and class of my acquaintance in Italy; and both
here and in the lovely diaper of cusped circles, composed
of the red marble of Perugia, with which the walls below
these chapel windows are lined, it is very easy to perceive
how greatly George Edmund Street must have been in-
fluenced by these features when designing the chancel of
his noble church of St Mary Magdalene, Paddington.
I have studied on the spot many architectural effects,
and I have never seen Italian Gothic work which can stand
being tested, spite of its imperfections of technique, against
Northern Gothic, Bourges, Rheims, Lincoln or Worcester.
But I do not think I have ever seen such an effect as the
entrance to the Lower Church of St Francis at Assisi, with
the light behind one, of combined line and colour, light
and shade, complexity and unity. And outside, what do
I know like this porch, loggia, and double staircase, all
grouping together?
In spite of all their architectural shortcomings, it must
be said that in the combination of painting and architec-
ture, all other architectural schools were hopelessly dis-
tanced by the Italians. All that is beautiful in their work
struck root in the thirteenth century; and it is in this mag-
nificent Church of St Francis at Assisi, that we see in per-
fection the combination of the two arts. One enters the
Lower Church * by a noble double door way with receding
shafts and a large wheel-traceried circle in the tympanum,
between walls panelled in patterns with that red Perugian
marble to which I have just alluded. A dark and sombre
collection of chapels--some square, some apsidal, fenced
* Illustrated on p. 42.
244
by cunningly-wrought screens of iron, and glowing with
the choicest productions of the glass-stainer's art, lead one
on to the high altar which, with its superb candlesticks,
stands at the junction of the four arms of the cross; and
as the eye becomes by degrees accustomed to the half light,
one sees and understands the subjects and colours which
Giotto and others have left on vault and pillar and wall.
This Lower Church at Assisi, heavy-vaulted and sombre,
suggests the sorrows and struggles of earth. It is a perfect
treasure-house and museum of art, containing a multitude
of curious or beautiful works, many of which, however,
can hardly been seen in the dim light. Here are those
three wonderful frescoes by Giotto, the Dante of painting,
typifying the Poverty, Obedience, and Chastity which St
Francis enjoined upon his followers; and also a fourth,
representing the glorification of the saint. There are many
works by his followers and pupils, and by later artists,
various in style, and unequal in merit, but all appropriate
to the spirit of the place, and deeply penetrated with re-
ligious feeling. In every direction is beauty; but above all
commend me to the stained glass, most of which is coeval
to the churches of Central Italy, which caused an enthusi-
ast to say of a window in the Cathedral at Arezzo, that it
was “not made with human hands, but let down from
Heaven for the consolation of men.”
At the west end of the Upper Church is a fine doorway,
similar in style to the northern one, but this is seldom open
now; and after drinking in the strange and mystic effect
of the crypt, with its incense-laden atmosphere, access is
gained by a small newel-staircase to the Upper Church.
What a change !
245
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
is
m
How to describe the first coup d'ail of this wondrous
structure I find no easy task. “Palace of gems" is the only
expression I can think of to convey my impression of it.
From the darkest of sanctuaries you find yourself in a
minute transferred to a fairy church of glowing and trans-
lucent colour. The space of window is so beautifully pro-
portioned to that of wall, that there is no disparity of
material, and the whole structure glows, a perfect feast of
mural and vitreous coloration. Do not think me running
into heroics. I was dumbfounded by the spectacle, and
must somehow find words to express the sensation. After
the crambe repetita of the Renaissance churches in Rome
and elsewhere, it is an indescribable relief to the Northern
eye once more to see a long vista of goodly arch like this,
to look up at the simple quadripartite vaulting compart-
ments, and to follow them on across the point where the
transepts debouch, to the glowing windows of the nobly-
groined apse. It isa sanctuary of earlyart, this Upper Church
at Assisi. These frescoes, of Scriptural subjects, those single
figures of saints within arcaded panels on the walls of the
transepts, which there can be no doubt formed the motif
for Butterfield's great work at the east end of All Saints,
Margaret Street, are to this day almost as fresh and bright
as when they first left the hands of Cimabue and his pupils
at the close of the thirteenth century. Cimabue commenced
his work here in 1265. The roof and walls of the aisleless
nave were then ready for him, and entirely undecorated-
with intuitive success. Now, the colouring that we find
in mediæval buildings, successful as it almost always is,
was not successful by accident, or by the application of
rules, but the existence of rules is not hard to find. Chev.
reul discovered a great many, and laid down remarks on
nay
LOV
in rem
246

THESE
om
Assist: INTERIOR OF THE UPPER CHURCH OF ST. FRANCIS.
TOSCANELLA: WEST FRONT OF STA. MARIA MAGGIORE.
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
position. It is different with form, the other great principle
and department of architecture. We cannot weigh form,
butwecan,soto speak, weighthemusic and poetry of colour,
and so lay down fixed principles of action. Indeed, there is
no subject in the present day more deserving the attention
of scientific men in relation to architecture than colour.
When, in 1874 a “ restoration” of the churches at
Assisi was decided upon, some anxiety was naturally felt
for the fate of the art-treasures enshrined therein. The lands
amounting, it is said, to forty-two estates, had been con-
fiscated, and the monks dispersed ; but what seemed far
worse in the eyes of archæologists and artists was, that
restorers, armed with the authority of the Government,
would be hard at work pulling away altars, knocking down
walls, and renovating frescoes. The priests, as a matter of
course, wereup in arms, and painters, and many others whose
cherished associationshad beenset atnought, wereclamorous.
However, the hold and, as some would say, rash enter-
prise fortunately fell into safe hands, and Signor Cavalcaselle
the collaborateur with Mr Crowein the New History of Paint-
ing in Italy was to be seen daily mounting scaffolding
raised in front of frescoes, or descending to excavations
made in search of some ancient but disguised structure.
The responsibility of the work was shared by Prof. Botti,
of Venice, and others. And so much interest was excited,
that a little company of architects, painters, and amateurs
was, for some months, gathered in Assisi. The Slade Pro-
fessor of Oxford, too, was there, making studies from the
frescoes; a German artist in the service of the Arundel
Society did more-heimproved on what he saw; his copies,
with one exception, which was said to be in facsimile, were
of the nature of restorations; they did not represent the
ret, Eh ayfell Me Crow daily
ding
247
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
pictures as they did in 1874, but as they might possibly
have been. In addition to these labourers, there were archi-
tects busy in the taking of measurements, and archæ-
ologists studious of masonry, and observant of other in-
dications of dates and styles. .
One morning, however, the restorations were found to
have made a sudden and startling jump. During the night,
by the aid of a score or so of men, the trumpery “Pagan
Roman” altars were swept away, much to the consecutive
alarm and indignation of the priests who came as usual to
say Mass. By this bold stroke of business light was let in
at darkened windows ; frescoes by the dozen, especially a
Madonna, Child and Saints, by Cimabue, were made to look
out once more from walls long masked ; while in place of
rococo carpentry, gimcrack ornaments, and imagery from
the toy-shop, stood the simple stone altars before which
the immediate followers of St Francis had celebrated and
worshipped. But this was not all. From the choir of the
Lower Church was taken a singing-gallery, whereby more
frescoes were brought to light, and in like manner from
the Upper Church, stalls and seats in tarsia work were
swept away from the apse and the adjoining transepts.*
That this wholesale measure exceeded the bounds of dis-
cretion there can be no doubt, still it cannot be questioned
that the work was brought back to its first estate, and,
moreover, by the removal of some other encumbrances, it
was practicable to restore the high altar from the nave to
its original site at the junction of the four arms of the
church. The collective result of these changes attained
the following ends : the clearance of a thousand and one
trumpery appurtenances, which having neither beauty nor
* Happily, these have been replaced.
w
jas
248.
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
antiquity to recommend them, offended common-sense
and pure taste; the reduction of altar ornamentation to
the comparative simplicity of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries, and the consequent restoration of the whole
fabric to its first estate. That much was gained for archæ-
ology, and scarcely less for art, no sane person could doubt
for a moment.
The plan and process adopted for the restoration of
the frescoes deserves some brief elucidation. Where a large
pieceof wallhad fallen into rottenness and was denuded of its
picture, it was simplycut out and replaced by sound cement.
Again, where only a small portion of the intonaco was
in decay, a chisel removed the crumbling mortar, and
a trowel replaced the void by firm material, which bound
the surroundings together as by a wedge or a plug. The
process was honest, the new and uncoloured mortar
speaking for itself.
Next, and chiefly, these parts were operated upon,
fortunately very considerable, which, though in decay and
threatened with destruction, were capable of preservation.
The malady which affected these frescoes at Assisi is
one common to the whole genus of wall-paintings. The
surface or pellicle of the picture was in blisters, the whole
of the mortar was disintegrated and ready to fall down on
the floor as dust, and the entire picture threatened speedily
to die if left to its disease. To fix these flying particles and
fleeting paints some glutinous medium was infused, and
then, with a gentle but firm surface pressure, the loosened
atoms of the picture were once more brought and bound
together. Furthermore, pains were taken to remove the
dust of ages by means of a soft brush or simple water,
and finally some fixing medium was washed over the
е
с
СЕ
249
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
surfaces and into the pores. The composition used was
said to be a secret, but I presume it was the silicate known
in Germany and England as “Wasserglas.”
The result of these operations, though not all that
might have been desired, was on the whole satisfactory.
Without the use of brush or the addition of colour, the
frescoes were wonderfully “refreshed" and they were
moreover placed en permanence.
On the dissolution of the Monastery of St Francis in
1866, provision was made for the due performance of the
services of the Church, and a few of the monks were re-
tained and subsidised for that purpose. As a matter of
general State policy, they are not allowed to retain the
picturesque garb of the order, but, dressed in black, they
assume the office and the aspect of ordinary priests. I
attended the daily-sung Mass in the Lower Church-
where, by the way, the tones of the organ produced a
most solemn and awful effect—which as to the music and
ritual was creditable to the clerical staff as now constituted.
Moreover, the Government, in laudable zeal for the pre-
servation of historic works, has taken the whole structure
as a national monument under its protection, and a small
annual grant is made for incidental expenses.
Little need be said of the now tenantless monastery
attached to this Church of St Francis at Assisi ; it was
never rich in art, though, judging from the great refectory,
which could entertain two hundred and fifty guests at a
sitting, it was bounteous in hospitality. Among the
novelties which the dissolution brought to light, were the
prisons for the incarceration of refractory monks. A visit
may also be paid to a small and prettily-planted cloister,
where are stowed away cartloads of skulls and skeletons
250
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
which for long years have cried aloud for decent burial.
The monks, it is to be feared, brought upon themselves
their galling misfortunes ; from lack of culture and from
want of vigilance they proved themselves the unworthy
guardians of priceless treasures, necessitating those drastic
renovations to which I have alluded elsewhere, and they
have written on the walls, in the most debased forms of
art, the low estate into which they had fallen.
The story which the Church of St Francis recounts is.
melancholy; originally set upon a hill as a light which
could not be hid, its brightness was turned into darkness;
the vow of poverty became first a mockery, and then grew
into a dire reality, until at last the whole city of Assisi pre-
sents a spectacle of mendicity, almost unparalleled in Italy..
Poor frati, blocked by the Government into a tiny
corner of this home they created! Its vast cloisters and
refectory, and dormitory, and the superb arcade built
mountains high against the slope, have been handed over
to a middle school, with a lickspittle marble inscription,
thanking some petty Minister of Education for his “spon-
In addition to the Church and Convent of St Francis,
and the Churches of Sta Chiarat and San Pietro, with their
* The Government actually pulled down the grand early thirteenth-
century mosaic screen and marble pillars of the fourteenth century
I asked of the melancholy-looking black sacristan friar who accom-.
panied me on my tour of inspection.“ Perchè sono matti,'' was the reply.
It lies stacking and perishing in the cloister of the cemetery-making
that sweet court of Death and Cypresses hideously squalid.
† The story of Sta Chiara (St Clara) is linked so closely with that of
St Francis in popular sentiment and imagination that it seems difficult
to think of the one apart from the other. Not only was Sta Chiara the
251
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
truthful western façades, and solemn uncoloured interiors,
no traveller who has any thought of one of the most extra-
ordinary enthusiasts of history, of his ardent piety, simple
self-denial and burning zeal, and who turned all his en-
thusiasm to the profit and power of the Church, will fail
to visit the fine Classical church of Sta Maria degli Angeli.
It lies close to the railway station on the left-hand side of
the line as the traveller approaches Assisi from Rome, and
its chief interest consists—not in the frescoes of Overbeck,
although these are very striking and fine, one especially,
the Vision of St Francis—but in the small rude Gothic
chapel which it encloses. Within this chapel St Francis
laid the foundations of his order upwards of six centuries
ago. There is a quaint antique simplicity about it, and as
one enters its low archway, and surveys its mean arrange-
ments, and the original cell of the saint hard by, the life
of St Francis rises upon us more vividly perhaps than at
any previous stage of our visit. Grand as were the imper-
in the splendid edifice on the heights of Assisi, here in the
rude memorials now before us, is the true expression of
the spirit of St Francis. It was here that the words of the
Gospel, as he read them one day, seized him with a literal
earnestness that inspired his whole career. "Provide neither
gold nor silver, nor brass, in your purses, nor scrip for
your journey, neither two coats, nor yet staves.” “Behold
ously cried ; and casting aside his sandals, and exchanging
chief rival of the Blessed Francis in the observance of Gospel perfection,
as an early chronicler calls her: she was also his chief ally in bringing
about that great religious movement which told so marvellously upon the
spiritual life of the West, and upon the history of the thirteenth century.
252
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
his girdle for a rope round his loins, he went forth without
even the staff or scrip of the mendicant, to proclaim the
Gospel of self-denial. It was in the year 1209 that this in-
spiration came to him. Slowly at first he made his way,
preaching repentance in the streets of Assisi, and saluting
all hemet—“The Lord give you peace !” A perfect passion
for self-abnegation possessed him. He stripped the clothes
from his back, and gave them to the beggars. He disposed
of the goods which he ought to have carried to the market,
to repair the dilapidated altar of God. When reproached
by his father, entreated by his gentle mother, and carried
before the Bishop of Assisi, that he might receive more
enlightened notions of the value of property, he exclaimed:
“I would gladly restore not only the money, but the very
clothes I wear." And so he despoiled himself of all his
clothes but his hair-shirt.
To honour St Francis with this Classical Basilica several
early memorials were swept away. An earthquake, which
went on with tremblings and quakings for near six months,
disabled it throughout in 1832 ; then it fell in all but the
dome, and has been rebuilt. A little way off is the garden
of thornless roses with blood-spotted leaves, which by these
freaks are suppose to preserve their own record of Francis
rolling himself there for penance, and have never been
selected or cultivated with any purpose ; and beyond this
again, the grot or hole in the ground in which he lived for
some time, now tortured into the semblance of a chapel
and then again, at near distance, another shrine (with
Francis' cords spotted with blood from the Stigmata in a
glass-case), obliterating the spoton which hedied so sacredly
on the ground, as he had lived, all love, humility, and
self-effacement. Even were all these relics genuine, it is
SO
SV
253
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
Y
melancholy enough to see the personal and the trivial push-
ing out for all who visit the place for religion's sake, or
at least absorbing the interest which should be taken in
his character and example.
St Francis himself is such an overpowering person,
especially when one feels what awful need the Church
has for a hero nowadays—that it was half strange to de-
vote but three days to seeing what Art had made of him.
The convent is an amazing place, and the art which it
enshrines a worthy art.
It is the art of faith, of simplicity, of severity. Even
the ultramarine ceilings of the Lower Church which issued
from Queen Hecuba's visible porphyry vase, are only a
responsive cheer to the azure skies above, and a declaration
that Heaven may be in the earth and under the earth.
The clear and splendid telling of the tale of St Francis
in so many scenes by Giotto in the Upper Church is of
course less spiritual and mystic than the Wedding with
Purity and the other scenes over the altar of the church
below, and as it is futile to tell myself what I like best
and love best, let me just remember the heresy of (I think)
Cavallini's picture to be the most beautiful. Giotto's pupil
has represented the Child Jesus with such intensity ex-
pressed in the clutch of the left arm, as well as in the use
of the right arm, and in the marvellous face telling His
Mother, who listens rapt, just asking with her thumb, “Is
that the Man?” that He has found one whom Heloves only
second to John, who stands sweetly behind, while the
subject of the story stands as one who is too modest to
bear even “Euge bone serve,” with his upper lipcurling and
shrinking from the lower as self-forgetfulness is compelled
to become self-conscious.
in SO
02
254
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
On the eastern side of a large paved piazza in the upper
part of the town we find the Cathedral of Assisi, dedicated
to St Ruffino. It is a very large cruciform building of late
Romanesque date, and although the exterior has escaped
pretty well, the whole of the interior has been transformed
logue of these pieces of pure wanton mischief which cause
the mediævalist to execrate their perpetrators.
But the western façade which is exactly commensurate
in breadth with the piazza before it, still stands in all its
mid-twelfth-century majesty and beauty. In it we see the
type of that at San Pietro, and the pale-brown stone of
which it is built has all the appearance of alabaster. At the
north-west corner is a noble square-topped campanile. The
lowest stage of the façade presents three grand doorways,
all with graceful carving round them. In the tympana of
the side doors are two birds and two lions drinking out
of one pitcher. Round the central door is a moulding
divided by those bolt-like fillets occasionally met with in
the Romanesque work of Northern Germany, into com-
partments enriched with carving of animals, birds and
lizards climbing up objects in pairs, and in the part im-
mediately round the arch are minute groups. In the
tympanum, within a circle, is a seated figure, whose cruci-
ferous nimbus marks it as that of Our Lord, having on
either side of the head representations of the sun and the
moon. To the right of Our Lord is a standing figure, and
to the left one seated in a chair and suckling an infant;
below are three heads. Couchant figures of lions protrude
from the plinths of all the three portals. Above this
pillarets, and next three very grand rose-windows, of
255
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
which the central one is the largest. Their tracery is
much of the same type as that in the other two Assisian
churches, but a peculiar feature of all these windows at
San Ruffino is that they are glazed inside the tracery,
in large sheets, so that when viewed from within their
tracery is not seen. Round the great circle are the symbols
of the Evangelists, and below it a shallow, oblong com-
partment, comprising three figures apparently holding up
the lintel. The façade probably ended, like that of San
Pietro, in the local flat top; but at a subsequent period a
low gable was raised upon it, and relieved as to its surface
with a Pointed, constructive arch. The facade of Spoleto
Cathedral presents the same feature, which was doubtless
intended for pictorial enrichment in mosaic
Although grievously altered during the Renaissance
epoch, the exterior of Assisi Cathedral has contrived to
retain something of its ancient character. Of especial beauty
is the apse, which is divided into five compartments by
pilaster strips of masonry connected by a wavy corbel-
tabling. This apse now protrudes from a huge ungainly
mass of wall roofed with one enormously wide gable, and
above it is seen one of those octagonal drums and domes,
crowned with a lantern and cupola of the same shape, which
we see repeated usque ad nauseam in Italian Renaissance,
and which have neither elegance of outline nor grace of
detail to recommend them. From the vicolo on the north
side of the Cathedral two very charming little bell-gables
can be taken into the view. Behind the east end of the
Cathedral is a pleasant kind of green, backed by lovely
hills, whose tops on the last morning of my stay in Assisi
were white with a slight powdering of snow. From this
point the campanile looks well. It is built of rough red
256
THE GOTHIC: ASSISI
reco
ay
stone in irregular blocks, and terminates in a low pyramid
capping. The windows in the clerestory of the nave
seemed, as far as I was able to judge, to be part of the
Romanesque structure, being small round-headed ones,
but owing to the manner in which the interior has been
reconstructed, they are quite lost when you get inside the
building.
Notwithstanding the irreparable mischief that has been
done here, the interior of San Ruffino's Cathedral has a
certain gloomy grandeur about it, which, when I viewed
it for the first time in the dusk of a November afternoon,
struck me, I must confess, with a kind of terror. The
absence of a clerestory may have something to do with
this, the nave being divided from its aisles by very tall
gaunt arcades of round arches on what I suppose would
be called Tuscan pilasters, between which rise taller
pilasters of the same order, supporting the transverse
arches of the vaulting, which is barrel-shaped and rises
directly from the entablature above the arches. The ceiling
is painted with figures of the Apostles seated within alter-
nately circular- and diamond-shaped compartments, and
the material of the piers, etc., seemed to be stucco painted
to look like marble. It is evident that the architect of these
reconstructions, whoever he was, left the outer walls of
the aisles and transepts--which by the way do not project
beyond the line of the aislesmintact, but he wanted to get
a great octagonal dome in the centre. Of this dome he
made the four cardinal sides much wider than the oblique
ones, which cut across the ends of the aisles and are solid,
being pierced only with low doors admitting to the tran-
septs, and fearful, darksome dens are the passages thus
formed. The four cardinal sides of the octagon between
257
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the arches are painted with huge figures of the Evangelists,
and each of the narrower ones with that of an angel, but
the upper parts of these paintings where they reach the
top of the dome have never been completed, or else they
have peeled off, for the rough stonework is visible. The
high altar stands under the dome, the sanctuary around it
being enclosed by a marble balustrade, while a wooden one
is thrown across the nave enclosing its easternmost bay,
within which are placed some common benches with backs
to them. On either side the high altar, but a little in advance
of it, are large statues of St Francis and St Clara, and im-
mediately behind it one of St Ruffino. The organ is in a
gallery within the eastern limb, apparently occupying the
old apse, and the wall on either side of it is pierced with
a common square window of the most offensive type. The
roofs of the aisles are vaulted quadripartitely and probably
form part of the original structure. There are no lateral
chapels, but debouching from the south aisle is a long
“winter choir,” terminating in an apse with stalls round
it. All here is in the most depraved rococo style, and calico
blinds, with paintings of cherubs' heads on them, veil the
hideous windows. On the left-hand side of this “winter
choir” is an episcopal throne, sadly in need of fresh
upholstering, and in a gallery over the entrance is a small
organ.
The conch of the great apse has a painting of the
Eternal Father surrounded by angels. Here are the stalls
of the chapter, with, in their midst, a throne for the bishop,
after the primitive manner.
Against the south-western pier of the dome is a fine
mediæval picture of the Madonna adored by angels, and
supported on either side by a bishop and a deacon, and
258
THE GOTHIC.: ASSISI
two other personages, one of whom is represented in a
pink dalmatic. These figures are comprised in three divi-
sions of rich Gothic frames gilded, with twisted pillars
and other ornaments commonly seen in such appendages.
most glorious autumn sunsets I remember. The clouds
were like those in Perugino's pictures, flat below, but
irregular above; and they reflected the most gorgeous
colours on the hills, which were themselves of an intensely
glowing hue. It seemed as if rays of every hue were shot
out from behind the clouds. When the sun was below the
western hills, the same pageant was more faintly repeated
by a higher bank of clouds, which reflected colours on the
western face of the Church of Sta Chiara which lay at my
feet.
The Cathedral at Arezzo is a fine example of the purer
Italian Gothic. The primitive church on this site was
founded over the tomb of St Donatus (patron saint of
this diocese), and was left perhaps in its very humble
primitive form till the Emperor Charles the Bald visit-
ing Arezzo, both recommended a new undertaking and
supplied means, bestowing property by diploma, dated 876,
for the erection of a more spacious and dignified church.
The new Cathedral was consecrated about 1045, and
was granted to certain monks who had a priory attached
to it. But the actual Duomo dates from 1278-certainly
not, as Vasari states, from 1260; for a testament preserved
of the works, provided the projected Cathedral should ever
be built. The original design is attributed to Jacobus de
Lapo, a German ; the execution to Margaritone (1212-
1289) of Arezzo.
259
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
The archivio attached to this church is a treasury of old
1
between the bishop and his chapter, dated 1277, impor-
tant to the history of this building, and containing the
words: “ Quod ipsam interiorem ecclesiam ad cathedralem
erectam, quæ antea appellabatur eccl. S. Petri, miro a
fundamentis opere construendam, et construi, faciamus,"
etc. In 1283 the Bishops of Fiesole and Volterra pub-
lished indulgences for all who should contribute to the
works of this Cathedral; and as Giovanni Pisano was
invited to prepare the sculptured shrine of San Donato in
1286, we may conclude that those works were completed,
or nearly so, by that time.
A façade was commenced in the fifteenth century but
left unfinished, owing to a visitation of pestilence, but it
is now in progress of construction and will, I am glad to
say, show the lean-to ends of the aisles in a legitimate
manner.
The exterior thus incomplete is comparatively plain,
but gains effect from its isolated situation, on the highest
ground in the city, still more from its elevation on a
lofty platform reached by steps on the west and south
sides.
The Cathedral of Arezzo is one of a group of churches
built during the second half of the thirteenth century,
and conceived much more in the spirit of the Early
Gothic style than were those in the southern part of the
country. It may be classed with Sta Maria Sopra Minerva
at Rome, and Sta Maria Novella at Florence, but, unlike
those two great churches, it has no transept, being merely
a parallelogram, with a polygonal apse and square-ended
260

AREZZO CATHEDRAL : THE NAVE, LOOKING EAST,
FLORENCE : THE NAVE OF STA. MARIA NOVELLA.
THE GOTHIC: AREZZO
aisles, and a very large chapel projecting from the north
aisle at its west end.
The nave is divided into bays which are absolutely
square, whilst the aisle compartments are oblong in the
direction of the building. This is exactly opposed to the
English and French system. It gives arches of great span,
and columns placed very far apart ; and one of the results
of such an arrangement is that the building looks smaller
than it really is.*
The columns are clustered against a great pier ; there
is hardly any moulding on the arches, and the clerestory
consists of small circular windows, one to each bay,
placed right under the longitudinal ribs of the plain
four-celled vaulting. It is a thoroughly fine and useful
building, and though not to be classed in the first rank of
architectural works, is deserving of careful study. In
Arezzo Cathedral, as elsewhere, I saw something to con-
demn as well as much to admire. It is satisfactory to
report of the restorations, begun, about 1865, at this
Cathedral by the architect Mazzi, whose designs were
executed under the superintendence of an able engineer,
named Gazzi. These works have met with general
approval, being pronounced successful in investing
the architecture more fully with that character aimed
at by its original authors. The elaborate delicacy and
* The piers are clustered, their plan being half-octagonal shafts at
the cardinal points, divided by the leaves of a large quatrefoil. The
bases are banded and finely moulded; the octagonal sub-shafts have
capitals of an almost Classical character under a square abacus, and the
arches are broadly pointed. The vaulting shafts rise, uninterrupted by
the capitals of the shaft supporting the longitudinal arches to a higher
level, where their capitals are connected by a horizontal string. The
arches are 33 feet wide from pillar to pillar, and the nave measured
across is the same.
261
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
ornamental richness of the Italian Gothic, seen in
other celebrated Cathedrals and Churches is not
found at Arezzo; but the building is a striking proof
of the deepening of the religious sentiment and in-
creasing boldness of conception manifest in Italian
art.
The Duomo at Arezzo is not cruciform, the plan being
merely a clerestoried nave of five bays, with aisles all
vaulted, but square-ended, and a three-sided apse—it is, in
fact, a long parallelogram, embracing nave and choir, with-
outany structural division between them. The church is long,
spacious, and lofty, the succession of tall piers, with their
slender engaged shafts bearing simply-moulded longitu-
dinal and transverse arches, is most effective in the rhythmic
sense of vertical emphasis which it gives—an emphasis
which perhaps might be more than ordinarily marked by
the presence of string-courses between the arches of the
arcades and the simple circular windows which light the
clerestory. Superior in stateliness, if vastly inferior in
dimensions, superior in perfect refinement of detail, in
quiet dignity of effect, the interior of Arezzo Cathedral
is as different from its great neighbour and contemporary
at Florence as it well could be. The noble sweep of the
high quadripartitely groined roof, with its repeated inter-
lacings of light ribs, the perfect proportions and skilful
planning of the apse, the refined dexterity of the furnish-
ing, the richness of the Cinquecento glass, and the presence
of several magnificent monuments especially those of
Bishop Guido Tarlati in white marble in the north aisle,
and that of Pope Gregory X. of equal beauty in the
opposite aisle-complete the intense impressiveness of an
interior, splendid in simplicity and imposing in the stately
262
THE GOTHIC: AREZZO
lift of its noble lines. And if the form is fine and stately,
and (especially on the interior) endowed with a kind of
unearthly beauty, like Butterfield's chef-d'æuvre at Stoke
Newington, or Bodley's at Cambridge, * so is the ordered
scheme of colouring, both constructive and applied. Ex-
teriorly, despite all that some pest of the confirmed
Italian has done to spoil the northern elevation-what
plagues these men were to be sure !-their vulgarity and
their viciousness grate upon us almost wherever we turn
-the gently-contrasted browns, greys, and creamy-whites
of the walls, the voussoirs of the windows, and other
details, stamp Arezzo Cathedral as a monument alike to
the devoted talent of its architect and to the loyally-
bestowed and highly-skilled workmanship of its builders.
No difficult problem of construction seems here to have
been attempted ; the plan has no complexities, it is simple,
sheer, and traditional; and yet, if it is built in abeyance
to prescriptive rule, if it is a transcript of a definite ori-
ginal, if it is not an inspired reincarnation of the spirit of
something that has been done before, the whole gives an
impression of noble dignity which is lacking in many a
larger building.
There is much beautiful detail on the exterior of the
Arezzo Cathedral, especially graceful being the foliage
in the capitals of the shafts to the three windows of
the apse—tall ones, each of two uncusped lights sup-
porting a circle filled with geometrical tracery - this
foliaged ornament being continued in a string round the
buttresses.
The tracery in these circles of the apse windows is of
the “ plate" kind, as is that in those of the south side of
*St Matthias' and All Saints'.
San
263
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
the nave, where they bear a resemblance to some early
windows in the nave of Paderborn Cathedral.
The tracery here, though somewhat peculiar, is very fine.
We have a very large two-light window, with a bold
monial and pointed arches to the lights, and a bold circle
in the head ; but the soffit of this is square in section, and
into it is inserted a wheel of tracery, also very square in
its section, and looking as though it had been cut out of
a plate of stone and inserted after the window was built.
Similarly the traceries in the magnificent Palazzi Com-
munale at Perugia are inserted under the enclosing arches
with no apparent connection with them--a peculiarity con-
stantly to be noticed in the works of the Spanish archi-
tects of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.
In all these traceries it is to be observed that the
piercings are invariably sharp and truly geometrical, and
that the ogee line is never used except in the head of a
trefoil, and both these are facts for which we cannot too
highly praise these old Italian architects; the two faults
which most old English architects committed having been
the frittering away of light by too much love of mould-
ings, and the constant tendency to degenerate into ogee
curves. While on the subject of window tracery I may
notice two peculiarities in Italian work, viz., the constant
use of shafts in place of moulded monials, and the very
frequent insertion of a transom of tracery across the
middle of the height of the window. The use of the
shaft instead of the moulded monial does not elicit our
admiration so much in ecclesiastical as in domestic work.
It generally accompanied the system, noticed in the de-
scription of Florence Cathedral, of fixing the glazing in
wooden frames behind the stonework, and hence, seldom
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THE GOTHIC: AREZZO
looked well in church windows, though, as at Florence,
where the lights are very narrow, it gives ample scope to.
the artist in stained glass.
The high altar of Arezzo Cathedral is glorified by one
of the finest triumphs taking it as a whole of mediæval
sculpture, the storied shrine of San Donato, a complete
biography of that saint in marble, though some parts are
into compartments, oblong, square, and semicircular, by
fine mosaics, niched figures and enamels on plates of
silver, fixed in the marble with great nicety and care. It
is in five main divisions, decreasing in height from the
central one, but all are rectangular, the side ones being
enriched with a cresting of little open cusped arches under
sharply-pointed arches, and the centre one by two closed
arches crowned with gables of a less acute character. All
these gables terminate in a rather large trefoil-shaped
ornament supporting a finial, and the sides of the gables
are richly crocketed. Flanking the reredos at either side
is an additional but much narrower compartment, also
crowned with an open arch gable, and beyond this is an
angular turret, finished with a crocketed and finialed pin-
nacle. Between each of the gabled arches over the five
of Our Lord, seated and holding an open book on His.
left knee, being placed on the one between the cresting
arches of the great central compartment. The sides of the
flanking turrets as high as the cresting are enriched with
two tiers of canopied figures, and secular figures adorn the
narrow vertical spaces between the five central divisions.
Immediately over the high altar, whose front and ends are
relieved with trefoiled arches on pillarets with two rows.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
of leafage in their capitals, is a predella, divided into five
spaces, each sub-divided into two lesser ones containing
half-figures of saints and angels. Thence rises the reredos
proper. In the large square compartment of the central
division is a half-figure of the Blessed Virgin holding the
Divine Child, behind whom is a curtain, drawn aside by
two angels, whose half-figures occupy the two upper
corners of the square. Over this is a pointed arch, set in an
oblong frame, and containing, within a vesica piscis, a figure
of the Virgin seated and crowned.* Angels in attitudes of
adoration occupy the spaces formed by the vesica with the
pointed framework of the arch, while in the angles made
by this arch and oblong panel in which it is set, cherubic
half-figures may be discerned. The oblong compartment
on the right-hand side of the Virgin and Child as the spec-
tator looks at it, contains a half-figure of St Gregory the
Pontiff in the likeness of Pope Honorius IV., vested in
a cope and crowned with the triple tiara. The left hand
holds an open book and grasps a fold of the cope, the
right hand being apparently raised in blessing, and behind
the figure is an imitation of tapestry, with the edges cut
into a series of semicircles. In the pointed arched com-
partment above St Gregory is a group of the Annuncia-
tion. The corresponding oblong panel on the left-hand
side of the Madonna encloses a half-figure of St Donatus,
Bishop and Protector of the city of Arezzo, whose remains,
with those of St Antilla and other saints, are believed to re-
pose beneath the altar. St Donatus, like Gregory, is nimbed,
and wears the mitre and a gracefully-folded chasuble,
whose orphreys as well as the lappets of the mitre are ex-
* On the breast of this figure is an ornament of gold, in the form of
a casket, which is said to have contained jewels of great value.
S
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THE GOTHIC: AREZZO
quisitely figured. His left hand holds an open book, and
his right, the pastoral-staff. The work on the tapestry
behind the figure is particularly remarkable for the beauty
and finish of its execution. A group representing the
Espousals of St Mary and St Joseph fills the pointed arched
compartment over St Donatus. The large outer compart-
ment on either side of those just described is divided into
two oblong panels and a semicircular one cut in half by
a slender mullion, by which means four small sculptured
groups are obtained ; and lastly, in the narrow space be-
tween this division and the flanking turret are two tiers
of figures, the lower one standing out from an oblong
panel, and the upper from an arched one cusped.
As this magnificent piece of work stands isolated in the
chord of the apse-the stalls being arranged along the
walls of the three-sided termination Giovanni was en-
abled to adorn the sides with small figures in alto-rilievo,
representing passages from the life of St Donatus.
In a work entitled Istoria del Pontifice Ottimo Massimo
il B. Gregorio X., descritta in tre libri, da Anton Maria
Bonucci, della Compagnia di Gesu. In Roma MDCCXI, is a
large folded plate representing this reredos at the high altar
of Arezzo Cathedral. The engraving from which the print
is taken is said to have been the work of one of the best
masters in Rome, the expense having been borne by Mgr.
Benedetto Falconieri, at that time (1711) Bishop of Arezzo.
Perhaps this reredos in Arezzo Cathedral has been
overpraised. It is executed in white marble, all the back
as well as the front being covered with sculptured subjects
inclosed in square or oblong panels, surrounded with small
reedy mouldings, and occasionally having inlaid patterns
and enamels between them. The sculpture of the capitals
ZO
267
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
is very inferior, and, though there are some exceptions,
the statues generally are squat and dumpy in proportion
and deficient in dignity. The architectural design of the
reredos is altogether weak and unmeaning, a confused
crowd of detail, gablets and pinnacles, with no beauty or
fitness in their combination. The most noticeable fact is
that the altar (which is of immense size, and no less than
4 feet 2 inches in height) is hollow, and entered by a
door in the back of the reredos; it is arcaded in front,
and pierced openings within the arcades give light to the
room formed within it. Over the entrance are inscribed
the words “ Sanctorum Lipsana.” There is a very similar
arrangement in the high altar of the great Middle Pointed
Church-a typical one of the “hall” class-St Elizabeth
at Marburg in Hesse.
Next perhaps to the reredos, the great glory of Arezzo
Cathedral is the painted glass which fills all the windows
on the south side of the nave, the clerestory on the same
side, the large circle in the façade, and the two lateral win-
dows of the apse. It was mostly executed by that William
(erroneously styled of Marseilles) of whom some account
was given in the second chapter.
I was not fortunate enough to see the glass in the great
western circle, as it had been removed pending the facing
of the façade, and is likely to remain concealed for some
years to come ; but I was enabled to form some idea of
what it must be like from the glass in the round windows
of the southern clerestory. It certainly is most magnificent,
and represents in four oblong (upright) compartments,
full-length figures arrayed in purple, green and brown
tinctures, admirably set off by the judicious use of white.
A blue in the robe of the Madonna, in the second window
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THE GOTHIC: AREZZO
from the west, is particularly magnificent. In the south aisle
the lights of the large windows are filled with groups, one
of which, the story of the Woman taken in Adultery, is
dated 1523. Here white has but little share, and although
the colouring throughout passes all description, one cannot
help feeling that the artist has tried to do more than the
limits of the lights at his disposal would admit of, so that
in some cases he has had to spread his groups over both
the openings. The accessories and backgrounds are, as
might be expected from the date of the glass, of a Classical
character, and, by consequence, hardly consonant with the
early Gothic type of window, in which one would have
preferred to see single figures of saints under canopies, as
at Assisi and Sta Croce. The east windows of the aisles
are deeply-splayed and moulded single lancets, with a tre-
foiled light placed in the plane of the opening, and both
are filled with stained glass of the richest description, but
like that in the southern windows of early Renaissance
date. * In the lancet at the east end of the south aisle is a
nude figure of Our Lord bearing the Cross, and beneath
it one of a bishop vested in a green cope. Viewed from the
west end of the south aisle, this window closes the long
vista of piers, arches and four-celled vaulting very har-
moniously, the ensemble reminding one of the view looking
west up the north aisle of Westminster Abbey. I think,
however, that I was most pleased with the glass in the
two side-windows of the apse, which contain each eight
standing figures, in tiers of four, but it seems a pity that
when the modern artist came to fill the central window
with stained glass he did not take that in the side ones as
* Externally the shafts of some of the windows have these capitals
sculptured with birds in lieu of foliage.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
precedent. As it is, the figures in the central window are
stiff and priggish, and their tinctures are strangely at vari-
ance with the soberly rich ones in the lateral windows.
During the three days that I spent in Arezzo I paid visit
after visit to the glorious interior of its Cathedral, which
seemed to increase in beauty at each successive one, so
that I had ample opportunity for viewing its superb
vitreous decoration under every condition of light.
Against the third pier of the nave on either side is a very
fine marble pulpit-angular—early Renaissance in style,
and supported upon shafts of varied marble ; but the
general effect of both is Gothic. The southern pulpit has
no figured sculpture in its panels, and the angle shafts are
of the Ionic order. The capitals of the shafts supporting
it are composite, and on a slab fixed into the staircase I
read the date MDLXII. The northern pulpit has its panels
richly sculptured with cherubs'heads enclosed within square
panels, and, in all probability, inspired the late Mr Penrose
with the idea for the pulpit erected about fifty years ago
under the dome of St Paul's Cathedral, to commemorate
the establishment of the special Sunday Evening Services.
Opening from the north aisle of the nave towards its
western extremity is a very large and sumptuously-fitted
chapel, composed of a nave and aisles of two unequal bays,
the former terminating in an apse, and the latter being
square-ended. The great piers dividing the two bays are
very fine, and composed of eight shafts grouped around a
cylinder. The first bay of this chapel is much wider than
the second, and is covered with a dome, whose surface is
divided into a number of panels in the Renaissance taste,
but the general effect is very imposing.
Adjacent to this chapel on the west is a small apsidal
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THE GOTHIC: AREZZO
Baptistery,containing a very elegant octagonal font of white
marble, relieved in its sculptured panels with red. Against
the eastern wall of this chapel is a model of the western
façade, as originally designed, and which, after a lapse of
four centuries is, as I have already observed, now in pro-
gress of erection, the marble casing never having risen
higher than the basement. The bells, formerly hung in
east, and rung from the outside, are now housed in an
octagonal campanile adjacent to the apse on the north
side, but it is not sufficiently lofty to form an architec-
tural feature in the panorama of the town.
The view from the north platform on which the
Cathedral stands, over the plain bounded by the Apennines,
is surpassingly lovely.
.
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CHAPTER VII
The Gothic—III. Florence : Pistoja : Lucca
THE oldest of the ecclesiastical buildings in Florence
I is undoubtedly the celebrated Baptistery of San
Giovanni, the core of which is supposed to be a Roman
or a Lombard building. However this may be, an external
coating of black and white marble was added at the end
of the thirteenth century by Arnolfo, who appears to have
monopolised all the best jobs of his time no doubt greatly
to the disgust of his contemporaries. And after all, if we
compare what remains of his work with what was produced
during the corresponding time in France and England, I
really do not think that Arnolfo has any claims to be
considered a first-class architect, much less a genius. Thus,
the marble placage of the old Lombard churches, rife with
historiated carvings and inlays, representing hunts, fights,
men, monsters and so forth, becomes in his hands a mere
succession of angles and panellings in black and white
marble, so that the effect of the Cathedral and Baptistery
which are thus treated, upon a mediævalist fresh from the
other side of the Alps, is apt to be anything but pleasing ;
and it requires all the art and beauty of the gates of
Andrea Pisano and Ghiberti to reconcile him for the
moment with Italian art.
So much, indeed, is this the case, that Pugin is said to
have compared the Baptistery and Cathedral at Florence
to magnified Brighton work-boxes, but the interior of the
former building quite makes amends for any faults of the
exterior. It is difficult to examine this thoroughly, from
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THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
el
the inadequacy of light; but the great features are the
row of columns below and the triforium-clerestory in
the thickness of the walls above, the whole being crowned
by an immense dome ornamented with innumerable figures
and stories in mosaic upon a gold ground. They are by
Andrea Tafi, Gaddo Gaddi, a Franciscan called Jacopo
(not Jacopo Torritti, the mosaicist of the Lateran), and a
Greek named Apollonius. The inferiority of these mosaics
to contemporary work in Florence is attributed to effete
Greek influence. Over the altar is the Majesty, attended
by the Blessed Virgin, St John Baptist and the celestial
hierarchy; underneath being the Judgment of the Just
and Unjust. The rest of the roof is devoted to scenes from
Old Testament history.
The centre of the building is said to have been occupied
by a large font surrounded by several smaller ones, much
the same, in fact, as we see at Pisa. However, what was
here was destroyed in 1577, and thus Florence lost one
more historical monument, for it was one of the charges
raked up against Dante (who doubtless rendered himself
sufficiently disagreeable, without having recourse to sacri-
lege) that he broke or destroyed one of these smaller fonts.
The centre of the building is occupied by a zodiac of
the twelfth century, executed in incised white marble.
The sun is in the centre, and the signs are placed around,
in connection with a good deal of conventional foliage.
But one of the great glories of the Baptistery was, and
still is, the dossal of silver which annually decorates the
altar on St John Baptist's day. This wonderful work,
preserved in the guarda roba, an edifice opposite the east
end of the Cathedral (which, in fact, answers to the trésor
of the French Cathedrals) was the work of many men, and
Swel
273
18
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
an
of many years_viz., from the middle of the fourteenth
until late in the fifteenth century.
To mention the artificers would be but to enumerate
most of the most gifted sons of the mediæval Athens,
and Ghiberti, Orcagna, Pollajuolo and Verrocchio are
among only a few of them. The small groups and statues
are most exquisite, both for movement and finish. And
the same may be said of the enamels, but the architectural
portion of the work by no means warrants high praise,
for to a Northern eye it appears full of faults and ill-
proportions; and the same sentence may be passed upon
a very large and splendid crucifix of the middle of the
fifteenth century, which on St John's day is placed on
the top of the dossal. The dossal itself is composed of
three compartments--viz., a centre and two sides. The
sides, as far as I could make out from the custodian of
the guarda roba, fold back at right angles to the centre,
so that the whole must have very much the appearance
of one altar placed above another.
One very curious thing should be noticed about some
of the enamelling, and that is that small paillons of metal
are placed upon the translucent blue enamel, probably
before it was melted, and are thus fixed upon the surface
or very little below it. The effect exactly resembles that
of some of the Japanese enamelled vessels which made
their appearance in England five-and-fifty years ago, and
it is by no means unlikely that the Florentine workers
may have imported the process from the East, perhaps
through Venice.
The greatest attractions of the Baptistery are, how-
ever, the three gates of bronze. The history of these
is too well known to bear repetition. This much may
OT
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THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
V
be said that the southern one, completed in 1330,
is the work of Andrea, the best, perhaps, of the
numerous family of the Pisani. The commission for
the northern one was won in fair competition by L.
Ghiberti, at the .commencement of the fifteenth century.
while the eastern one is the more mature work of the
same artist.
The northern and southern doors are much of the same
design, viz., square panels containing groups of figures in
alto-rilievo, the rails and stiles in Ghiberti's work having
delicate foliage, while in the other imitation jewels supply
the place. In both, the figures are all that could be desired,
and when gilt, as most of the mediæval bronzes were,
the effect must have been very beautiful and splendid --
of course I mean when the gold had got slightly oxidised.
I think there is very little doubt but that the Greeks left
their bronzes of the natural colour of the metal, and perhaps
preserved them from oxidation by means of a coating of
varnish or encaustic. Too often nowadays, no sooner does
a sculptor produce a statue in bronze, than he carefully
tones it down to the colour of a chimney-sweep.
The eastern door, generally considered as Ghiberti's
chef-d'æuvre, is hardly so successful, in an architectural
point of view, as the others.
Firstly, the compartments are very much larger, and
secondly, the subjects have elaborate backgrounds of trees,
houses, etc., all represented in perspective gradation.
The Church of St Mary of the Flower, that is, of the
Lily, was begun in 1294, to replace the old historic Church
of the Sta Reparata which resembled that of San Miniato.
The foundation was laid on the Feast of the Nativity of
the Blessed Virgin, 8th September of the year above-named,
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
by the Papal Legate, to the honour of God and St Mary of
the Flower, and a tax on public expenditure, a graduated
poll-tax or legacy-duty, indulgences and pardons were
ordered for the purposes of the work.
At this epoch the architect to the Florentine Republic
was Arnolfo di Cambio, to whom the bulk of the fourteenth-
century monuments existing in the city are due. Among
them may be mentioned the Palazzo Vecchio and the
Bargello, and the great typical Franciscan Church of Italy
---Santa Croce.
Until the death of Arnolfo in 1310, the works at the
Duomo * had been carried on, despite intestine commo-
tions, wars, and fire. The exile of Dante occurred at this
period.
A failure in the funds suspended the works until 1331,
and in 1334 Giotto was appointed chief master of the work
of the Cathedral, and to him was also entrusted the over-
sight of the other works undertaken by the Republic.
The design and erection of the Campanile belong to this
period, but Giotto died in 1337, when the tower had reached
about one-third of its present height.
On the death of Giotto, his grandson, Taddeo Gaddi
was, among others, entrusted with theoversightof the works
on the Campanile. Not only was Gaddi an accomplished
architect, but he was a painter who achieved great celebrity,t
and to him we owe one of the most complete and beauti-
ful series of frescoes ever produced by that golden age of
1
* For some of the facts relative to this Duomo at Florence, I am in-
debted to a valuable paper on “Filippo Brunelleschi and the Renais-
sance," read lately before the Architectural Association by Prof.
Beresford Pite.
† One of Taddeo Gaddi's works is the Ponte Vecchio, with its charm-
ing lines of shops.
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THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
Italian art, the fourteenth century. I refer to those in the
Chapter-house of Sta Maria Novella.*
referred, observes :-
os There are few items so wholly illustrative of mediæval beauty
and feeling as some of these decorated chapels at Florence, and
one does not wonder at the enthusiasm either of the critics or at
the raptures of Ruskin in discussing them. Upon a wall of this
chapel the visible Church is typified by the Duomo of Florence,
which has its proper nave of four bays, but with flying buttresses,
and an octagon crowned by a cupola of very similar Pointed form
to the present one surrounded by the semi-domes of the transepts
and eastern tribune. But it is important to observe in this carefully-
drawn representation, in which we find early perspective nervously
making itself evident, the fundamental variations from the present
Cathedral. Some of these are the existence of flying buttresses, as
well as the extending raking buttresses to the transept apses, also
the treatment of the square angles of the octagon, but chiefly the
absence of the great upper storey of the octagon, corresponding to
noted in the setting out of the vaulted apses to the transepts, the
apices of which are built in front of the walls, but we observe
that a lantern is added to the dome. The whole forms an unmis-
takable representation of the Duomo, about half a century before
Brunelleschi erected his dome, which, apparently so long before,
was decided upon and accepted both in its general lines and
defined intentions."
“Old things had passed away; old designs appeared unsuited to
the new conditions. To such a spirit the Duomo, begun sixty
years before, in days of comparative weakness, seemed hardly
to correspond with the demands of the more lavish and luxurious
age. Florence was more pre-eminent than ever among the cities
of Tuscany, and her Duomo ought to be representative of her
present power and wealth. Accordingly, and doubtless after much
deliberation, it was resolved, 'out of regard to the magnificence
* In 1567 this building became the chapel of the Spanish colony,
and therefore is now known as the Spanish Chapel.
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
of the commune, and the riches and fame of the city and the
citizens,' to adopt a new design for the Duomo on a grander
scale than that of the building planned by Arnolfo. The breadth
was to remain the same, perhaps in order to preserve the beautiful
side walls already constructed, but the walls were to be raised
about 21 feet, the length was to be increased by more than
a third, and the central area and the eastern end of the church
were to be vastly enlarged. This change of design required not
only the destruction of the work already done within the walls,
but also the strengthening of the foundations, and a doubling of
the façade wall.”
Prof. Norton adds :-
- This reconstruction of the Duomo has been generally
overlooked by the historians,” and “it appears that only a
general scheme of the reconstruction was adopted, leaving the
consideration of details until the time when, in the progress of
the work, a decision in regard to them might become necessary.
Probably all that remains of Arnolfo's building are the founda-
tions and part of the interior brickwork of the façade, and the
side walls for about 175 feet eastward from the front."
heme of the recans,” and it has been
Francesco Talenti was appointed architect, having suc-
ceeded the celebrated Andrea Pisano, and in 1357 the
digging for the foundation of the new piers was begun.
Ruskin has fallen upon the vast scale of the interior with
zest in his Mornings in Florence; the contrast to the scheme
of the conventual and collegiate Cathedrals of France and
England which employ a developed multiplicity of parts to
give measure to the eye is very marked, but the difference
might almost be described as that of one mind to many. The
simplicity and homogeneity of the design of the plan, the
apparent thinness of the side walls being that of the pre-
existent design, is attractive and architectural. I would
venture to urge that to a mind prepared to admit all the
charms of the nayeof Westminster, with its lofty proportions
and narrow vistas, it should not necessarily be impossible,
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THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
difficult, or provocative of that eloquent vituperation cus-
tomary to the last generation of enthusiasts, to accept and
value the purpose and dignity of this great provision of
width, spaciousness, and reduction of pillar-area evident in
the huge municipal nave of Florence. This spaciousness is
Italian, the vast cool enclosure in the hot sunny climate is
a phase of ecclesiastical design required by circumstances,
and is here achieved with constructive skill and common-
sensenot inferior to any traditionaldevelopment of mediæval
buildingsin northern circumstances with different materials.
The rubble core and ashlar facings of the north make greater
demands upon the floor space than the slender brick piers of
the south, and in a just comparison it is not so evident that
the naye of Florence deserves Mr Ruskin's narrow but bitter
judgment that“ the most studious ingenuity could not pro-
duce a design for the interior of a building which should
more completely hide its extent and throw away every
common advantage of its magnitude than this is, of the
Duomo at Florence.” It is not till 1382 that activity at
the Cathedral is again evident, for in 1383 the building of
the chapels to the choir was commenced and commissions
distributed for sculpture. In 1407, after nearly forty years,
the eastern tribune, with its five chapels, was completed,
and at the threshold of the Cinquecento the construction
of the octagonal vault could no longer be deferred.
Architects had their little difficulties in the fifteenth
century as well as in the twentieth century. Even as late
as 1420 the Signora of Florence, and what we should call
the Board of Works, were still refusing to believe Brun-
elleschi's plan possible, and pompously debated over it
while he was maddened by their doubts. A competition
was opened in that year for possible plans, and we can
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
imagine how the impulsive and talented architect must
have laughed and raged alternately at some of these sug-
gestions. One was that a column should support the
middle of the dome; another, that an immense heap of
earth mixed with small coin should be raised in the
Cathedral, so that the structure of the dome might be
supported till its own completeness would build it; then
the advantage of the earth and small coin would be that
the people would remove the supporting pile free of
charge for the sake of the coppers. :
At last Brunelleschi's service was accepted, instead of
any of these brilliant plans, and he built that dome which
suggested to Michael Angelo the idea of its grande sorella
at Rome.
For the dome of Florence Cathedral M. Yriarte, in his
sumptuous monograph on that city, expresses a greater
degree of admiration than it is entitled to : “Elle dépasse
en audace et en harmonie tous les monuments de l'art
moderne,” is his verdict.
The great claim of Brunelleschi to admiration is in his
thoroughly workmanlike way of building; he alone of
those who wished to construct it knew what he was about;
it is an eminently well-built dome, and is invested with
an additional interest when we learn that it is an almost
solitary instance of the application of the dome on a large
scale to what may, on the whole, be regarded as a Gothic
building. But as a piece of design it cannot be so highly
praised ; its base is weakly treated, and the lantern is in
itself a poor design, and clumsily adapted to the huge
mass below it. The shade of Brunelleschi must rest con-
tent with engineering rather than architectural honours.
It is popularly supposed that Arnolfo did nearly the
S.
280
THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
whole work of the Duomo at Florence. Nothing, however,
can be more untrue, as has been so ably shown by the two
eminent authorities from whom I have quoted. Arnolfo
probably got no further than the lower part of the choir
and transepts, and their chapels. As to whether any of the
marble casing of these parts is to be attributed to him is
an open question. It certainly shows a very great advance
over the marble casing of the Baptistery which, we are
while the Cathedral was begun in 1294. Now the marble
casing of the Baptistery agrees far better with the façade
of San Miniato, and with that of a large abbey called
does with the casing of the east end of the Cathedral ;
the latter of which, if by Arnolfo, entirely wants the
“figure intagliate,” which Villani tells us were expressly
ordered to decorate the new building. +
* Villani's language is somewhat obscure : his words are “Si fecione
intorno a San Giovanni i pilastri de gheroni di marmi bianchi e neri
per l'arte di Calimala che prima erano di macigni," and then goes on
to say that the tombs were taken away.
† Parts of the marble casing of this Duomo on the exterior being
under repair, I was enabled to see its construction. In the first place
I was told by the Clerk of the Opera that the inside walls are composed
of brick with layers of stone, and that there are numerous and very
great cracks, notwithstanding the precaution that we are told Arnolfo
took of digging sundry walls all about, so as to obviate the action of
earthquakes, which were then believed to be caused by subterranean
water. This core was of course built with proper bonding courses for
the marble casings, which was farther secured by iron cramps. In the
middle of the fourteenth century the dark green marble came as it
does now from Prato, the white marble from Carrara, and the red from
San Giusto a Monterantoli. In the facade of Sta Croce, only finished
half a century ago, the white marble has been procured from Serevezza,
and the red, which is of two qualities, from Granfagnana and the
Maremma.
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Poor Arnolfo, he must have had his hands quite full,
for in 1298 he had the additional work of the Palazzo
Publico thrown on his hands. How could he find time to
design the “figure intagliate,'' and how can we be sur-
prised if he took refuge in the ugly square panels with
reversed trefoil arches all alike, which give the whole
building the work-box-look so justly complained of by
Pugin?
At all events, if he did the casing, he certainly did not
do the windows, which are evident insertions, perhaps of
Taddeo Gaddi's time.
After Arnolfo's death the work (as we have seen) lan-
guished, or seems rather to have been laid aside until
Giotto took it up in 1332, when, as we all know, he
built a very considerable portion of the Campanile and I
also suspect began the nave; for one of the windows in
the easternmost part of the south aisle is evidently earlier
than the other.
If a print in Richa's work on the churches of Florence
is to be credited, either Arnolfo or Giotto began a west
end, which was carried up less than half-way. The plate,
which is very rude, professes to have been taken from a
MS. in the possession of some Florentine family, but the
architectural features are sufficiently marked to prevent
1583 by Benedetto Ugoccione.
In Giotto's Campanile we see the difference between
employing an artist and a mere architect. There are no
figures in Arnolfo's work, whereas in Giotto's the marble
lives and tells the grand story of the invention of the arts
and sciences and the progress of civilisation.
In 1360, the work having been stopped, was begun
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again, and in 1364 the vaults (perhaps those of the aisles)
were turned by Taddeo Gaddi.
Now in that picture by Memmi in the Chapter-house
of Sta Maria Novella, to which Prof. Pite has alluded,
and where Memmi worked in conjunction with Taddeo
Gaddi, is a representation of a church which is generally
supposed to stand for the Florence Duomo, but I suspect
it is simply meant as the symbolical church, and as such
may bear some resemblance to the Cathedral, but with
Memmi's own variations. The principal features are a
great dome over the cross, and the half domes over the
transepts. At the same time, if we examine those parts
executed prior to the time of Memmi, we shall not find
their details agree with the actual building, and I am
therefore much inclined to think that Memmi was simply
drawing his idea of how he would have designed the
Cathedral if he had it to do from the beginning.
Filippo di Lorenzo was architect from 1384 to 1396,
and was paid eight florins for each month, and from that
time the work went creeping slowly along (so slowly,
indeed, that it passed into a proverb) until the end of
the fifteenth century, for the art evidently gets later and
later as we approach the west end.
In the meanwhile two most celebrated men had been
employed : Orcagna who, I am inclined to think, finished
the top storey of the Campanile, for it is clearly later than
the lower parts; and Brunelleschi, who built the present
dome and put the stained glass in the windows of the
tambour.
The marble casing was in hand until 1583, when Bene-
detto Ugoccione having finished the clerestory turned
about for something more to do, and thought the best
Co was
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
thing would be to build a new west front after the fashion
then prevalent. To do this he had to pull down what had
already been done. By this I do not mean the west end,
before mentioned as having been begun by Giotto or
Arnolfo, but a mass of sculpture mingled with bad archi-
tecture, both Pointed and Renaissance. In fact, it was the
dregs of the Pointed school, and by no means so pure as
the schools at Oxford, or any of our latest Pointed build-
ings. The subsequent history of the unfortunate west end
of Florence Cathedral is rather curious. Ugoccione had
tenders from various builders for the demolition of the
casing, which only went up about a third of the whole
height, and of which a contemporary drawing remains in
the Opera.
Of course he took the lowest tender (two hundred and
twenty-five crowns), and of course the contractor did not
pay particular attention as to how he performed the work.
The consequence was that the whole, with the exception
of one or two statues, got utterly broken and smashed, as
it very well deserved to be; and Ugoccione could not even
hope to use the remains in his new works. Then the Grand-
ducal architect, who had urged him on to do the deed,
found an obstacle to the realisation of his own design in
the shape of a hated rival. For the Grand Duke, as usual
on such occasions, could not refrain from a competition,
and two designs were chosen instead of one. Then there
was a grand squabble, and the Grand Duke died, and
nobody got the job. Then after several years there was
another grand competition and another grand squabble;
but this time, among the different academicians. The
design of Baccio del Bianco was chosen, and in fact begun,
but the people grumbled so much at it, that it was never
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THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
carried out. Then, in 1661, a design painted on canvas was
put up, and remained until a high wind blew it to tatters.
Then, in 1688, ten painters from Bologna perpetrated a
sham front, in fresco, which before the middle of the last
century had almost completely disappeared. And finally,
in 1862, there was another competition open to all the
world. The whole question was not finally settled until
1866, the design selected being that by M. de Fabris,
Architect of Florence. Many of my readers are doubtless
aware that the western wall, devoid of all decoration,
except the ridiculous attempts above noticed, and con-
taining merely three doors with three circular holes over
them, had stood, in all its ugliness, since the early part of
the fourteenth century, so that the work entrusted to
M. Fabris consisted only of facing. It was not, however,
until 16th August 1875, that the first stones under the
plinth could be fixed in their position. These begin at a
depth of 23 feet below the street level, and about a year
later they had reached the level of the top step just out-
side the doors, from which point the white marble facing,
26 inches thick in average, commences. The materials used
in the construction of this new façade to the Duomo at
Florence, consist of three kinds of marble; white from
the quarries of Henvaux, in Serravezza, green from Prato,
and red from Gerfalco, in the province of Siena. All the
stone was supplied by the municipality, but the labour
was paid for by public subscription.
The uncovering of the central portion of this new
façade to the Florence Duomo took place in 1883, and
the whole was disclosed to public view four years later,
The work as a whole is very fine, and reflects the greatest
credit upon its designer, Signor Fabris, who, unfortunately,
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
did not live to witness its completion. Over the central
portal is a bas-relief of Our Lord in glory, surrounded by
angels, blessing the city. Directly under the great rose is
a large statue of Our Lady holding the Divine Child in
decorated with twisted columns, inlaid with mosaic, of red,
gold and green. On each side are raised the Twelve Apostles
in separate niches. In the arch of the central door is a
mosaic representing the Blessed Virgin, receiving oblations,
with lilies at her feet, and on the architrave is the coat of
arms of Pius IX., who gave 3000l., and a precious
inosaic to the building fund. To the right are the arms
of the House of Savoy, and to the left those of the House
of Lorraine; both of whom were munificent contributors
to the work. Besides these, there are several other coats
of arms of principal donors.
Arnolfo appears to have designed his building with refer-
ence to something which was to occupy the central space
where the choir and nave intersect the transepts. What he
intended has not come down to us: he might have had
the idea of reproducing the dome of the Baptistery, and
covering it with a conical roof; or he might have had the
more glorious conception that Fergusson hinted at in his
Handbook of Architecture, viz., to place at the crossing a
large and high steeple, rising gradually and telescopically
by successive stages, and resembling what we now see in
the church at Chiaravelle, near Milan. Arnolfo would
appear to have erected the church as far as the two eastern-
most bays of the nave; but the last bays are evidently
later works, and were probably rising at the same time as
Giotto's Campanile; and each being a sort of double bay
on the outside, and a single bay on the inside, the conse-
SOT
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THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
e
1
quence is that the windows are blank, while inside there
is another blank window in the middle to correspond with
the real windows in the other two easternmost bays. The
whole of the exterior, as well as Giotto's Campanile, is in
the work-box style, though I am perfectly aware that they
have their admirers, with whom I have no wish to pick a
quarrel. The tower is, however, a very superior specimen
of the art, the niches being perhaps the least satisfactory
thing about it. Like many of those structures, this Cam-
panile at Florence serves as an architectural satellite to
the principal church, and by its regular outline, its uniform
size, and its imposing cornice, resembles the architecture
of Greece. It is built of light-coloured marble, adorned
with statues and mosaics, and the whole execution is in
the highest degree exquisite; but yet it seems to fail in
the proper effect of architecture, and to be more admirable
for the beauty of the details than for the grandiosity of
the whole. Its narrow, unbuttressed outline give it, in
northern eyes, an air of primness and monotony. Nor is
uniformity of size in harmony with such loftiness of
elevation.
The gem, perhaps of the Duomo at Florence exter-
nally, is the Porta dei Servi. The sculpture in its tym-
panum,“ La Madonna della Cintola,” ascribed to the hand
of Jacopo della Quercia, has also been traditionally ascribed
to Nanni di Banco. One may be allowed to feel sceptical as
to conclusions based in such a case on merely internal
evidence, and it would hardly be worth while either to
Some points in the architectural detail of this doorway
may be briefly remarked upon, as, e.g., the rich treatment
of its archivolt, which, in its succession of well-marked and
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
bold mouldings, is in curious contrast with the exceedingly
flat and even tame treatment of other portions of the de-
tail; the very Classic feeling that permeates most of the
foliage decoration, especially the running scroll-work in
one of the broader orders, is very different from anything
that is found in Gothic buildings anywhere but in Italy;
and the bad and rather trumpery taste of some of the inlaid
ornaments, especially the treatment of the wide band run-
ning round the sculpture panel in the space within the
crocketed gable which crowns the doorway. Fortunately,
however, this is not sufficiently obtrusive to mar the general
effect; but it is an example of the lapses of taste which are
found in the detail of the Cathedral, and in a lesser degree
in some of that in the Campanile.
To my mind the Duomo at Florence internally is one
of the most disappointing buildings I have ever seen, having
the very great fault of St Peter's at Rome, and of Revived
Classical structures generally, viz., that of looking much
smaller than its real size.
Covered all over with gold mosaic, the interior might
appear tolerable, such as we see partially applied at the
west end; but then, it may be asked, what building of this
class would not look well if covered with mosaics on a gold
ground. The arches of the arcade are of an immense span,
square-not a parallelogram, as with us—and the vaulting
of the aisles of course assumes the latter form, but with
the longer side stretching from east to west.
There is no triforium, and the clerestory is restricted
to a single bull's-eye window. The line, therefore, of the
wall rib comes most unpleasantly near that of the arcade,
and the whole effect is starved and mean.
288

FLORENCE CATHEDRAL : THE NAVE, LOOKING EAST,
FLORENCE : THE NAVE OF STA. CROCE, LOOKING EAST.
THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
A gallery carried on machicolations, runs right along the
church at the springing of the vaulting, and as it is carried
round the pilasters which take the vaulting, it looks ex-
ceedingly clumsy. We find the same composition at Sta
Croce, except that there is a gabled roof of wood in that
church instead of vaulting, and the clerestory windows are
tall ones of two lights. Of this latter building, also attri-
buted to Arnolfo, an illustration is given, by the side of
that of the Duomo.
But what fully repays the student in the Duomo at
Florence is the stained glass, which I declare without hesi-
tation to be the most magnificent I have ever seen, and
concerning which I must offer a few remarks supplement-
ary to those already given in these pages.
The notices of this magnificent glass in the Duomo of
Florence are very meagre ; some of them are merely stated
to have been executed in 1434 by a Florentine artist,
Domenico Livi da Gambasso, at Florence. He had learnt
the art at Lübeck, where, in the apse of the great red-brick
Marienkirche, is some stained glass strikingly reminiscent
of the best Florentine examples. Some of the glass in the
Duomo, however, must be earlier than Gambasso's time,
especially a figure of St James in one of the upper windows
of the transepts. The entire series is remarkably rich in
colour, and consists of the Prophets and Kings of the Old
Testament, and the Apostles and Saints, clad in most strik-
ing and picturesque costumes, such as Freiligrath has de-
cribed in his “Pictorial Bible," presenting a fine example
of those “storied windows richly dight,” which Milton
has celebrated in his Penseroso.
They are formed of small and irregular pieces of stained
glass, and in the ensemble present no extreme delicacy of
289
19
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
execution nor peculiar depth of shadow; the effect being
obtained by a rich combination of colours, excellently
arranged, and very much in accordance with the scientific
principles enunciated by the best men of the present day.
The robes are seldom of one tint, but are richly worked
with ornamental patterns of a bold and effective character.
The features and drapery are seldom strongly marked in
shadow, and the former, though in some cases, as in Moses
and the King, very finely expressed; yet in others, as in
St Simplicius, are very rudely formed a defect, however,
not easily remarked at the distance they are placed from
the eye, whilst the object which the artist evidently sought,
namely, a rich combination of colour, is perfectly obtained.
The dark leaden lines with which the small pieces of glass
are welded together, without any regard to where they
occur, are also lost in the distance ; while the important
result is produced by means of these black lines, that much
greater solidity and a much stronger effect of colour are
obtained. They impart increased contrast and distinctness
to the separate tinctures and to the entire composition,
which, if not treated in this manner, is apt to become con-
fused and flimsy-looking even at a short distance; indeed,
it may be taken as a general axiom, that the blending of
tints, unless in subjects very close to the eye, should be
avoided in stained glass as simply labour thrown away.
All the figures of this series of windows in Florence
Cathedral are nobly designed and full of character. They
are represented standing or seated beneath niches or re-
cesses, shown in perspective, inlaid with various coloured
marble in panels, at the back of which is shown a deep blue
sky. In the lower part of the lancets, where the figures are
coupled, they touch each other, there being no central
re
290
THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
mullion to intercept them. Many of the inscriptions are
formed of yellow letters on a black ground, and the orna-
mental borders, of simple and effective design, are remark-
able for their resemblance to those executed during the
thirteenth century in England.
During my stay in Florence, I had an opportunity of
examining the surpassing beauty of this stained glass in
the Duomo more closely. The openings being very large
-the mullions of the windows are only apparent on the
exterior--the colours are more massed than with us, but
then each colour is subdivided into a great many different
tints, so that we have a jewel-like effect combined with
great distinctness. The glass itself, more especially the blue
and red, is very streaky, and most of it very heavily-toned
on both sides, the yellow becoming by this means in parts
quite orange. By toning, I do not mean smudging over the
surface with the brown enamel by which the lines are
marked-a trick which some of our stained-glass artists
early in the Gothic Revival indulged in-but a process
which probably was effected by grinding up the coloured
glasses, and burning them on by means of a flux. The best
of all the windows is, no doubt, the great circle at the west
end, representing the Assumption, and to which I should
be inclined to give the preference over any other Italian
stained glass that I have ever seen. The lead-lines of the
ground run concentric with the circumference of the circle
(an arrangement followed by Sir Edward Burne-Jones in
his work at the east end of Waltham Abbey Church), and
while the two or three outer rings are occupied by a greyish-
blue, all the rest of the ground is filled up by a much more
intense and brighter tone of the same colour, most of the
pieces of which differ from each other in tone, and are ex-
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
cessively streaky. It is almost impossible to describe the
brilliancy arrived at by this method.
The majority of the windows are said to be the work of
Francesco di Domenico da Gambasso, a Florentine, and
the date given is 1434. Donatello and Ghiberti are said
to have had a hand in some of the later ones, but the
probability is, that if the windows were carefully examined,
there would be found as many different artists employed
upon them as there were architects to'the building. Indeed,
in very many cases, the professions were identical, and the
same man could equally design a building, paint the walls
in fresco, fill the windows with stained glass, and make the
marble express his thoughts by means of sculpture. Giotto
was one of these, and the practice was continued long
after, as in the case of Vasari. Thirty years ago even our
boasted manufacturing skill was at fault, and we could
show no glass so soft in colour and so streaky in texture
as that with which Gambasso worked. Happily, at the
present day “nous avons changé tout cela," and as regards
stained glass we are consequently what we are.
I was often puzzled how the glass was arranged in those
windows which have a detached column instead of a mullion,
but upon getting up to them I found that the glazing is
at least í foot behind the column, and continues equally
behind the tracery; that is, the stained glass is in one large
and broad lancet, and about i foot in front of it is a
column supporting unglazed tracery. The glass is fixed
by means of lockets and stanchion-bars, exactly like those
2 inches apart, and the lockets project, and are fastened on
the outside. Between every locket-bar are three stanchion-
bars, also on the outside, and the lockets themselves are
THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
Ser
about 7 inches apart. Inside, of course, the windows in the
Duomo show as single lancets, with two figures, one above
another, or one above two, within a deep border, and the
shadow, thrown by the outside tracery, is rather advan-
tageous than otherwise, for it darkens the upper part of
the glass.
In one of the transept windows is a most grandiose
figure of St James, under a canopy. The combination of
colours is rich and harmonious, and the design both of the
figure and the drapery is in the highest degree artistic.
There is no archaism or exaggeration here. The whole
effect is produced by bold massing of colours, entire ab-
sence of pretty frippery, and skilful use of bold lead-lines.
The great breadth and simplicity of the treatment through-
out should commend themselves to English artists in
seeking motifs. There is no relief by white or uncoloured
glass here ; but then it must be remembered that in Italy,
unlike England, the object of stained glass is to exclude
the glare of light. With us light can scarcely be too abun-
dant. What we require in stained glass is to colour our
light, not to diminish it. Hence the importance of con-
trasting the positive colours with an abundance of white
glass.
I have already mentioned sundry blank windows in the
interior of this Cathedral. These at first sight appear to be
filled with stained glass like the others; but, upon examina-
tion the visitor finds that they are only shams, i.e., they are
the transparent pictures described by Theophilus. This
latter author directs the space destined for the picture to
be covered with tin-foil, then burnished and finely painted
in oil-colours.
Now these at Florence are the only ones of the kind
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that I have ever met with, executed according to the
There used, I believe, to be an imitation window in the
Chapter-house of York Minster, but whether tin or silver
leaf was employed for the ground, I am not in a position
to say.
The lower parts of the windows in St Stephen's Chapel,
Westminster-burnt in the fire of 1834 and never rebuilt
--were occupied by paintings, but then they were regular
subjects painted on an opaque ground, and the head of
the north door of the Sainte Chapelle at the east end of
the glorious Abbey Church of St Germer, between Gournay
and Beauvais, is likewise painted in imitation of grisaille
glass, but it is quite opaque, and there is no tin-foil below,
na-
ments in reddish-brown. By the courtesy of some work-
people, I was furnished with a long ladder, which enabled
me to reach up to these sham windows. I found them to
be painted in distemper upon canvas stretched on a frame,
and the glittering effect is obtained simply by gluing on
pieces of coloured tinsel for the high lights. The black
lines representing the lead-lines are very thick, and there
is no tinsel used on the faces or hands, but where the
tinsel is employed, it is always in small pieces placed an
eighth or a quarter of an inch apart. So well are these
windows executed, that nearly everybody takes them for
real glass in the first instance.
The choir of the Cathedral is formed immediately under-
neath the dome, in an enclosure of the same shape, viz., an
octagonal one. The walls surrounding it are enriched with
sculptures by Baccio Bandinelli. It is by looking at these
sculptures, and the Hercules and Cacho in front of the
1
THE GOTHIC: FLORENCE
Palazzo Vecchio, that one begins to sympathise with Ben-
venuto Cellini, who is always grumbling at him and his
works in the latter part of the Memoirs. The upper part
of this enclosure has been taken down, and a rather tall
framework of wood and glass substituted to protect the
canons and choir from draughts.*
The portion displaced is, I believe, to be seen in the
Opera, where are also preserved two beautiful statues, said
to have come from a chapel destroyed when Giotto built
his Campanile, which, I should have remarked, sadly wants
the spire originally designed to terminate it. Brunelleschi's
wooden model for the present dome is also preserved at
the Opera. It is a very rough affair, and was probably only
meant to show to his employers, who, perhaps, could not
understand his drawings.
Like many another great Tuscan church, the Duomo
of Florence is full of that interest derived from its being
a mausoleum of greatness and a museum of art. Here re-
poses the dust of Giotto and Brunelleschi, in spots marked
by commemorative busts; and the same honour is paid to
Ficino, the great restorer of the Platonic philosophy.
Here is also a portrait of Dante, of doubtful authenticity,
representing him in a standing posture, in a robe of red,
his head crowned with laurel, and holding an open book
in his hand. The countenance is intellectual and melan-
choly, showing marks of pride, sensitiveness, and suffering;
and, whether an ideal head or a likeness, it is that which
has been made familiar by Morghen's portrait and the out-
line of Flaxman, and which rises up spontaneously before
the mind's eye, whenever the name of Dante is mentioned.
* Of the grandeur and solemnity with which the daily Offices are
performed in Florence Cathedral, I have already given some account.
m
in
I
a
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The Baptistery of Pistoja,* which stands opposite the
west front of the Duomo, might vie favourably with its
more renowned neighbour at Florence, but no Ghiberti
has modelled for it its gates; its simplicity and beauty are
too modest to satisfy the general, and the octagonal
Baptistery of Pistoja, with its delicate fourteenth-century
details, and its characteristic effect as a whole, will stand
many a year before the name of its cunning designer and
its builder are commonly known.
This famous temple of San Giovanni, or the Baptistery of
Pistoja, was built by Andrea Pisano, who employed Cellino
di Nese da Siena to superintend and direct the works.
Signor Bartolini, by whose care this elegant example of
fourteenth-century Gothic was restored about twenty years
ago, has proved that a more ancient Baptistery was built
on the site now occupied by the present structure, for in
a document in the archives of San Jacopo, signed by the
Notary Amadio Guidaloste (1256), we read of “repairing
the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Corte, dilapidated through
age.” The MS. and unprinted historia of Pandolfo Arferoli
inform us that in January 1303, it was resolved to demolish
all that remained of the ancient Baptistery, and to erect a
finer one in its stead. It is not quite certain in which year
Andrea Pisano commenced the work, but from Signor
Bartolini's studies and researches, it results that they were
commenced about the year 1333. It is safe to say that the
shell of the building was finished six years after, as we read
in the archives of Pistoja that the workmen of San Giovanni
e Zeno came to an agreement with Maestro Cellino da
Siena about the clothing of the walls with Carrara marble
and marmo verde di Prato (green marble from Prato). It
* Illustrated on page 174.
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THE GOTHIC: PISTOJA
.
entirety, for from the above-mentioned MS. of Arferoli we
learn that a ball of gilt bronze was made in that year to
be placed on the top of the cupola.
The learned archæologist to whom I have alluded, has
proved that this Baptistery at Pistoja has undergone
repairs in the course of different centuries, very often to
the detriment of its original construction, as some of the
principal architectural features were altered, and important
decorations, which were an essential element in the original
character of the edifice, were demolished.
Researches in the interior of the Baptistery led to the
discovery of some ancient chapels of the mediæval period,
and which had been covered with marble, and are men-
tioned in the archives of the city. The remains or indica-
tions of these were discovered in the sides of the octagon.
During a series of bungling repairs the chapels had been
walled up with brick masonry, perhaps for fear of the
whole building coming down with a run. Prof. Bartolini's
discovery, therefore, was purely accidental.
The position and shape of the staircase by which access.
was obtained to the external Gothic pulpit on the right
of the principal door, was studied.
But the most important result of these researches was
to have ascertained that, in Pisano's original building, the
cupola did not commence immediately above the storey
still in existence, but that spot was occupied by another
storey with an arcade, with windows in the Gothic style,
alternated with slender twisted shafts. This higher storey
pinnacles. When Prof. Bartolini came to examine the
octagon, nothing remained of the second storey and of the
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
arcade, but some traces of foundations and two pinnacles
corresponding to that part of the church above the façade.
The Professor drew a plan of the edifice as it was origin-
ally built by Andrea Pisano, drawing the whole from the
remains which he found in the course of his researches.
This scheme, however, has not been carried out in the
restoration of the edifice, but the opinion of the architect
was fully confirmed by two ancient drawings of the
Baptistery, discovered in the municipal archives, one of
which bore the date of 1603, the other 1753, in which the
base of the cupola is represented as being adorned with
two storeys balustraded and shafted in the Gothic style,
and, as it was generally believed, to have been since the
erection of the building.
The Pistoja Baptistery is a graceful specimen of Italian
Gothic, in which we observe the increasing use of sculpture
for external decoration, and, in the interior, the proof
(important for the history of Ritual) of the practice, con-
tinued up to the comparatively modern date when San
Giovanni was built, of baptising by immersion. The
octagon, which has a square-ended chancel attached to it,
is vaulted with an eight-sided cupola ; the chancel having
a quadripartite domical vault, with ribs (trefoiled in
section) springing from corbels. The chancel arch is of
two plain orders, with a roll in the nook; the capitals are
banded-stiff flowers under a moulded abacus ; and the
piers are half engaged, with a mutilated figure in relief
upon each nook shaft. In each alternate side is a large
Pointed window, not much splayed ; inside there is a plane
which diminishes the orifice, and which being cut into the
shape of an unfoliated arch thus becomes the actual head
298
THE GOTHIC: PISTOJA
of the window. We see the same feature in Giotto's Chapel
of the Arena, at Padua. At the end of the chancel is a
similar window, now blocked. There are three doors, on
the east, north and south sides (the Baptistery it should
be observed being, to use an Irishism, orientated to the
west, and its principal door facing the west end of the
Cathedral). This door is of two plain orders, with coupled
nook shafts, banded capitals, heavy horizontal lintel and
round-headed tympanum ; all under a Pointed crocketed
and pinnacled canopy with an elaborate panel in it like a
wheel-window. In the tympanum is a beautiful relief of
the Madonna with two Saints. The north and south doors
have each a Pointed tympanum.
The font is a large square one of white marble, with
panelled sides. On the south wall inside is a good Pointed
cinquefoiled niche with spiral columns, containing a figure
of Salome, with John the Baptist’s head. Externally, there
is a plain, lower stage, with, however, a good basement,
and an upper stage, richly arcaded with trefoiled Pointed
lights under crocketed canopies, and with pinnacles at the
angles. Above is an eight-sided pyramidal roof. Just to the
north of the door opposite the Duomo is a pretty external
pulpit, under a deeply recessed trefoiled Pointed arch,
well moulded and all horizontally banded with black
marble. The spandrels of the cusps are charmingly carved
in foliage.
The Church of San Paolo seems, externally at least (for
it was closed for repairs and therefore inaccessible), to be so
purely Pointed Gothic, that I have classed it among Pistojan
works of that epoch.
The city and state of Lucca became at an early period in
Christian history the seat of a church that rapidly developed
299
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
in extent and splendour. Legend, eager to find an Apostolic
origin for all the conspicuous Italian sees, represents this
bishopric, like that of Pisa, to have been founded by an im-
mediate disciple of St Peter, in this instance, one Paulinus.
The bishopric, before its elevation, in 1712, to metropolitan
rank, was immediately subject to Rome, alike with all others
in Tuscany, andits prelatesaffixed their signaturesto synodal
decrees as suffragans of the Pope. Tradition, indeed, assumes
the very name of Luccato be derived from her earlyillumina-
tion by that “ Lux” whose source is eternal: as expressed in
the quaint verses of the Dittamondo by Fazio degli Uberti:
de
“Ma perchè illuminata dalla fede
Fu pria ch'altra cittade di Toscana,
Cangio 'l suo nome, e Luce se la diede.”
7
A noticeable record of this church is extant in statistics
drawn up by order of Pope Alexander IV., in 1260, from
which welearnthatthecitythen contained fifty-eightchurches
and five monasteries; the suburbs twenty-two churches and
six monasteries; the entire diocese five hundred and twenty-
six churches and thirty-eight monasteries, including thecells
of hermits; theecclesiastical revenues amounting to 120,000
ducats per annum. At present Lucca has four collegiate and
eleven parochial churches. San Frediano, founded in 685,
restored or rebuilt, as we now see it, by its capitular clergy
in or soon after 1105, is almost the sole church in Italy that
still retains features of the Lombardic period, supposed to
be preserved unalteredinitsinterior, though with theadjunct
of new chapels, and with a newly-elevated choir-still a most
interesting and singular building.
The type of ecclesiastical architecture prevailing in Lucca
is Lombardic-Romanesque, more fantasticand barbaric than
Or SOO
300
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
Vo
the Pisan variety of that protean style, but strikingly
characteristic and relevant to the history of art and sym-
bolism.
The Cathedral is a noble cruciform structure comprising,
as far as the commencement of the transepts, a nave of six
bays, with a deep loggia or portico running the entire width
of the church at the west end, but broken into at its south
end by one of those beautifully-proportioned steeples so
common in Lucca and its environs, with windows increasing
in number as they ascend, and tall forked battlements;
transepts equal in breadth to two bays of the nave ; a choir
of one bay terminating in a semicircular apse ; and square-
endedaisles. From the easternside of eithertransept a square
chapel, commensurate in length with the choir aisles, has
been thrown out in Renaissance times. The whole, whether
viewed from the north-west or the north-east forms one of
the most beautiful architectural groups it is possible to con-
ceive, and its tout ensemble is enhanced by the exquisite pale-
brown hue of the materials with which it is built.
The Cathedral, dedicated to St Martin, stands on the
site of a church founded in the sixth century, and was
built, though not with its actual extent, by the liberal
and zealous Bishop Anselm, who was raised to the papal
throne as Alexander II., but retained the Lucchese see
after his elevation to such supreme dignity.
He caused the new Cathedral to be commenced in 1060,
and consecrated it himself in 1070; but the church of
that period was smaller than the present one by the whole
extent of the choir and tribune, added between 1308 and
1320 ; the section, namely, where we see the Pointed style,
contrasted with the round-headed arches in the other
parts.
301
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
.
1
The façade, where the Pisan type is specially recognised,
was built by the architect Guidetti in 1204, as indicated
in the epitaph on a scroll, held by a relief-figure, among
the accessories on this church-front: “Condidit electi tam
pulchras (probably columnas understood) dextra Guidetti.
MCCIV.” But the portico, with three arches of wide span,
producing the most engaging effects by contrast of light
and shade, was added thirty years after.
The sculptures on this façade, on the pillars of the
portico, and on the walls between the three great door-
ways admitting to the nave and aisles, will occupy the
attention of the iconologist for an unlimited period.
They are very interesting, and of a most varied char-
acter.
A bas-relief of the Deposition from the Cross, in the
tympanum of the door to the north aisle, by Niccola
Pisano, of 1233, is invaluable as the earliest performance
of the revived art due to that great restorer, whose name
is ever in our minds or on our lips when visiting the great
Cathedrals and Churches of Tuscany.
Other reliefs and statuettes—to describe which in detail
would require more space than can be afforded-are com-
paratively barbaric, but most curious in their illustrations
of legends and symbolism.
Nondescript animals climb or coil around shafts and
capitals; on one pilaster we see Adam and Eve, also the
Tree of Jesse ; on right and left of the central doorway
are groups from the life of St Martin, among which he
may be discerned dividing his cloak with the beggar,
celebrating Mass at a plain altar, with nothing on it but
a chalice and a book, whilst a flame hovers over his glori-
fied head, and casting out a devil from a possessed person,
302
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
The two latter subjects are explained by the following
lines inscribed upon them :-
“Ignis adest capiti Martino sacra libante”
“Demone vexatum salvas, Martine beate.”
Here, too, the twelve months are represented by familiar
actions appropriately chosen ; as January, a man seated
beside a fire : April, a man with flowers in his hair; June,
a reaper ; August, a vintage ; September, the treading of
grapes ; October, wine-making ; November, ploughing
with oxen ; December, a man cutting up a swine. These
allegories of the months are placed on panels within
arcades on pillarets of some subfuse-hued material, and
besides them are graceful representations of the symbols of
St Matthew and St John-the Angel and the Eagle. With-
in the tympanum of the central doorway is the Majesty,
placed in an aureole, with ten angels flying towards it,
holding in its left hand, resting upon the knee, a book,
while the right hand is raised in blessing. In the lintel we
see the Virgin and the Twelve Apostles, all represented
standing ; and in the tympanum of the right-hand door is
a group representing St Regulus disputing with the
Arians.
Besides all these interesting and valuable specimens of
that archaic school of sculpture which preceded the advent
of the Pisani, there is beautiful incised work in black and
white; red marble forms the material of the attached
shafts supporting the arches, which line the inner wall of
this loggia, a lovely specimen of the latest Romanesque
style, as it is an illustration of quiet and subdued natural
polychromy.
At the north and south ends of this loggia is an arch,
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THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
rather narrower than, but similar in design to the three on
its western face, and the porch is roofed longitudinally
with a very plain barrel-shaped vault.
The interior of Lucca Cathedral, so different from what
the exterior leads one to expect is, in my humble opinion,
next to that of Milan, the noblest in all Italy; the light
from painted windows-mostly modern and, unhappily,
not of the highest order, but solemnly subdued ; the ex-
quisite colour of the material of which the pillars, walls,
shafts and other details are composed; the lofty triforium
of gracefully traceried openings carried boldly across the
arches spanning the transepts; the painted vaults; the
general effect, that of vastness beyond the actual dimen-
sions, and due to the majesty of architectural design rather
than to sumptuousness of material; all impressed me so
deeply that I recurred to this glorious interior at every
possible opportunity.
In the nave the arches are round, the columns grand
angular masses, with foliated capitals, similar in shape to
those of Florence Cathedral, but surpassing them in ele-
gance of conception and outline, but the Pointed style is
seen in the lancet windows, in the choir and transepts, and
in the tracery of the triforium, one of the finest that
Italian churches possess at once aerial and grandiose.
The quadripartite vaulting, which runs uninterruptedly
from the west end to the arch opening into the apse, is
painted all over with figures and decorative borders; rich
profusion of art-works and several fine monuments, claim
attention after one has begun to observe in detail. Hitherto
I have confined myself to general characteristics; now I
will proceed to bring the chief features of this wondrous
Duomo before my readers with greater particularity.
304
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
Luss.
The variety of colour and the harmoniousness of its
disposition is one of the most charming features of the series
of arcades above the loggia in the facade of Lucca Cathe-
dral. Here we have pillarets, circular, twisted, enriched
with carving, quadrupled, entwined with snakes, patterned
in black and white zigzags, white, with little black arcades
incised in it, white, with little black diamonds, rose-colour,
sepia and black. But if the colouring here fascinates us,
equally so does the delicious pale brown of the northern
elevation of the nave. Here we have bold buttresses (rare
aves in Italian Pointed) divided into stages of cusped arcad-
ing and niched for statuary. Then there are the windows,
wide unchamfered lancets, the simplest yet the best of
their class.
On either side of each lancet is a detached shaft, stand-
ing in advance of the wall ; it is supported by a corbel
and carries a pinnacle, the finial of which is a figure of a
saint; a course of dark marble r'jand the edge of the arch
takes the place of a label in defining its outline, and a
crocketed gable of steep pitch, over the arch, and dying
against the pinnacles, completes this very simple yet
effective design.
The clerestory presents a series of shallow round arches
on pilasters placed at intervals with six round windows,
and the roof is of tile, and low.
The elevation of the south aisle is the same as that of
the north, but it is much more subdued in point of decora-
tion, the buttresses being quite plain. The transepts form
an exact square on plan, each side having six tall shallow
arcades on pilasters, and the arches being patterned out in
squares of black and white. These arches do not, how-
ever, reach as high as those of the nave clerestory, the
rou
305
20
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
superimposed space being occupied by small diamond-
shaped mouldings.
There is no lantern or dome at the intersection of the
nave and choir with the transepts, the roof of the first-
named being prolonged as far as the apse.
One of the finest general views of the Cathedral can be
had from the walk on the walls, to which the building is
neighbouring, on the south side of the city, but it can be
advantageously viewed at short distance from the level
ground about it, there being large open spaces on all sides,
The fourteenth-century restoration of 1308-20 added
greatly to the beauty of the church, and seems to have
inspired models quite other than the Pisan. The Gothic of
France and Germany was making itself felt in Italy, and
the interior of the Duomo, as well as the greater part of
its external walls, was to a considerable extent translated
into Gothic forms. It is in the eastern part that the Pisan
school of Romanesque reappears in all its purity-the high
blind arcade, with its slender engaged shafts, rising from a
continuous base, its bands and alternate voussoirs of dark
marble, and its lozenges under the arch-heads, is carried
through the whole breadth, including the apse, where
three alternate arches are filled each with a fine round-
headed window, having two orders of jamb-shafts and arch-
mouldings. The next storey assumes the open galleried
form of Lombardy, while on the flat wall the arches,
four on each side, are divided by an engaged pilaster into
groups of two arches each, separated by a slender column
just detached from the walls. This abnormal arrangement
gives variety to the composition, while it does not detract
from its unity.
Altogether the exterior of Lucca Cathedral is excellent,
306
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
the principle on which the construction of its style is
founded seems to me just; it consists in using columns,
without regard to the rules of the four orders, as supports
to arch-work, entablatures being given up, and when we
cidedly as supports, that for this purpose they were origi-
nated, we cannot demur at the kind of superstructure they
support. If the original system of construction, that of
simple repose, is no longer in general use, why should the
entablature be retained as a necessary finish to the column?
The absurdity of placing it as a sort of pedestal between
arch and capital is evident--for it can mean nothing--and
there are numerous examples, both in the Romanesque and
the Renaissance of Italy, to show that it is destructive of
beauty, lengthening the opening to lankiness, weighing
over much on the column, and useless in itself. If the
semicircular arch is the most beautiful form in architecture
—and there are some who say it is—and the species of
construction most common, and scientific in our days,
why hide it or avoid it, and if used, I think, observation
will assure us that the opening is better in general-less
than double its height than more. The column then may
justly be used as the immediate and sole support of arches,
on a small scale; but when the opening is large, even though
sufficient, as shown in the case of the interior of San Fredi-
ano, where the imposed weight seems crushing, one would
say that piers are better than single columns, as at the three
great arches of the porch of the Cathedral, and that broad
and successive mouldings are required to render the arch
perfect. The large plain ovolo foliage sculptured mould-
ings of this style, placed between the various stages, is not
307
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
(a regular cornice would be very bad), but greater height,
more answering to a moulded frieze than a cornice, but a
cornice is wanted somewhere. This is a great loss to the
style, as are the general forms of the outline, the exces-
has germs of a power in it which, judiciously chosen, applied
and worked out with the superior manual cleverness of
our day, might become more universal than either Italian
or Gothic architecture, and I cannot help thinking more
imposing, when we consider that Pisa, St Mark's, Venice,
and Lucca, are more or less examples of its capabilities.
As I have already descanted upon the beauty of the in-
terior of Lucca Cathedral en ensemble, I will dwell no
further on this point, but proceed to indicate the most
salient features.*
The nave is of six bays, which are continued across the
transepts, giving an uninterrupted range of eight arcades
of round arches on piers compounded of a Greek cross,
with slender cylindrical shafts niched in the angles, and
crowned with two rows of very boldly sculptured leafage.
Beyond these eight arcades is one more, but with Pointed
arches, and then comes the apse, which is vaulted at a con-
siderably lower level than the rest of the church, so much
so that there is room in the wall-space above the arch
opening into it for a circular window, on either side of
which the wall is richly frescoed.
Perhaps the glory of the interior of Lucca Cathedral is
its triforium, which as at Pisa is carried boldly across the
opening to either transept, and also down its centre, the
breadth being subdivided by an arcade similar to those
just described. This triforium at Lucca is very lofty, two
* A view across the nave is given on p. 66.
308
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
1
a
windows being comprised within each vaulting bay, which
coincides with the pier arch in length. They are composed
of three trefoiled openings on slender shafts, and in the
space comprised bythese openings and the round arch-head,
the most elegant tracery is formed by filling the spaces be-
tween interlacing arches with cinquefoils.
In considering the traceries of Italian Gothic, we must
remember that there is more than a suspicion that some of
them were executed by foreigners. The Church of San
Francesco at Assisi, which is said to have been designed
by a German (except its west front, which is quite Italian
and provincial), affords examples of tracery at least as good
as any of its date (thirteenth century) in Germany—the
windows in the western choir of the Dom at Naumburg
featuring those at Assisi very strongly ; and in Perugia,
we find other examples in the Church of San Domenico, and
in the transept of the Cathedral, of distinctly German char-
acter,--provokingly ingenious in their geometrical clever-
ness—whilst by way of contrast in the grand Palazzo
Publico in the same city is a series of admirable Italian
traceries, executed with that total disregard of Northern
rules, for which they are so remarkable, and yet with a
charm of effect which admits of no dispute.
Of the windows in the triforia at Lucca, I can only say
that not only are they quite Italian, but, without doubt,
the loveliest specimens of their age in that country.*
The encompassing arches of the triforia rise to the level
* The semicircular arch does not always lend itself pleasingly to tracery
of the Pointed epoch, but in these noble tribunes” of Lucca Cathe-
dral, where the arches are well elevated, the idea has worked out ex-
tremely well. But it is impossible to praise the same arrangement in the
depressed window-heads of the Capella della Rosa, in the same city,
the Or San Michele, at Florence, or the Capella della Spina, at Pisa.
309
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
of the carved capitals of the pilasters which, resting upon the
abaci of the nave piers, support the traverse arches of the
vault, the spaces formed by them with the lateral arches of
the groinings being pierced with circular windows, devoid,
in the nave at least, of tracery, and filled with stained glass
in patterns.
I should have observed that the triforium is returned
across the west end of the nave, and in a manner produc-
tive of the finest effect. Here, however, each window has
four openings, and above is a beautiful wheel-window of
seven compartments. Between the triforium and the west
door the space is plain, but at the west end of either aisle
is a richly-moulded circular window, with tracery formed
by the intersection of two triangles, a cusped circle being
placed in the polygonalcentre. Behind the triforium arcades
at the west end we perceive the three coupled round-headed
lancets of the façade. These are filled with stained glass in
patterns presenting a pleasing admixture of blue and red.
The nave and aisles have the usual four-celled groining,
which is pointed, while the transverse arches occurring at
the interval of each pier are round. The latter are left plain,
but the vaults themselves are richly painted a dark blue,
spangled with gold stars, and in the middle of each cell
is a medallion enclosing a bust. In the aisles there are no
medallion figures in the cells, but like those in the main
vault they have a very deep border of foliaged ornament,
interspersed with small circular medallions surrounding,
if memory serves aright, a bust.
Lancet windows, placed high up in the walls, light the
aisles. They contain modern stained glass, which it is not
possible to praise, representing single figures of saints in
double tiers. There seems to have been no attempt in this
I
es
ain
310
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
glass to assimilate it to ancient work ; it is modern of the
modern, and may be classed with an immense quantity of
glass placed in English churches during the last half-cen-
tury without proper architectural supervision.
Below each window is an altar with a retabulum com-
posed of two pillars supporting an entablature and a pedi-
ment, and flanking a picture. The columns vary in order,
some being Corinthian, others Ionic, and so on, but they
harmonise far better with the environing architecture than
one would be led to expect.
The effect of the triforium carried upon two arches
across the entrance to either transept is very beautiful,* and
the manner in which they unite with that which extends
the whole length of the transept up its centre produces an
effect which is of such surpassing loveliness, as to baffle
all description.
The clerestory windows here are much richer than those
in the nave, being cusped and, moreover, filled with tracery
comprised within the shapes produced by two intersecting
triangles. They are, of course, unglazed.
A late chapel has been thrown out from the eastern wall
of either transept, that on the north being fitted with stalls,
altar, and a lectern for the daily capitular Offices, which at
the time of my visit to Lucca, in November, were recited
here. Probably it constitutes what is known in Italy as a
chiesa hiemale, or “winter choir.” A huge antiphonarystood
on the lectern in the centre of this chapel, which is separ-
ated from the transept by iron gates wrought into patterns
of quatrefoils enclosed in circles, and also by glass doors.
* The late Mr William White, F.S.A., has introduced this Luc-
chese arrangement in the nave of his fine church of All Saints',
Kensington Park.
311
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
na
The choir aisles terminate square, and against the eastern
wall of the south aisle is a most charming reredos of the
Cinquecento school. Immediately above the altar is the
base of the structure, the “predella,” I believe, is its proper
name, carved with three subjects in oblong panels repre-
senting the martyrdoms of SS. Regulus, John the Baptist,
and Sebastian, whose effigies occupy semicircular niches
with domes of a shell pattern. Between each niche is a
composite pillaret supporting an entablature, above which
is the recumbent figure of the bishop, by Civitali, with a
standing figure at the head and feet. In the wall behind
asters, the middle one of which rises to an arch, and con-
tains a seated Madonna.
I should have observed that the circles in the clerestory
of the two bays spanning the transepts are larger than those
in the nave, and are filled with delicate tracery of varying
pattern.
The triforium on the eastern side of either transept is
very graceful but considerably lower than that which inter-
sects the cross-arm of the church. It is composed of two
windows, enclosing two rather wide trefoiled openings sup-
porting a cusped circle. Over this, but with a rather high
wall-space between, is a round window containing tracery
formed of six spherical triangles, cusped and disposed round
a circle.
This refers to the bay nearest the choir. The triforium
of the other bay has a deeply splayed but blocked lancet,
above which is a circle with the above-described intersect-
ing triangle tracery. Behind the triforium arcades of the
first bay is seen the lean-to wooden roof of the passage over
the choir aisle. There is no corresponding triforium on the
312
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
western side of the transept but a small circle placed high
up just under the vaulting. A similar window fills each of
the two corresponding compartments on the southern face
of the transept. These circles have their rims very richly
moulded. Below this is a tall round-headed arcade, half of
which only is glazed with the same vulgar description of
painted glass as that in the nave aisles. This description
serves equally well for the north transept, to which there
is an entrance on the western side by a shallow door on
coupled shafts, and whose semicircular tympanum encloses
sculpture.
In the bay intervening between the transepts and the
apse the arch is pointed, rises considerably above the rest,
and is sprung jointly from the last isolated column and a
pilaster-respond, retaining some traces of ancient painting,
with a poor narrow capital.
Here the triforium has two windows of two openings
apiece, both trefoiled and surmounted by a quatrefoiled
circle ; over this is a plain circle containing white glass.
The pier between the two triforium windows is square.
Very simple is the semicircular apse terminating the
interior of this glorious fane. To the north and south of
it the wall is pierced by a shallow Pointed arch, and in the
centre by three round-headed windows, rather long, placed
low down in the wall and filled with magnificent ancient
glass. At the top of the central window is the Annuncia-
tion, in the centre, within an oblong compartment, a
seated bishop, and below that two figures, one in episcopal
costume and the other in a dalmatic. The two side windows
of the apse contain Cinquecento glass representing seated
figures of the Evangelists, SS. Matthew and Mark being
placed to the north, SS. Luke and John to the south. The
313
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
tinctures are superb, but the general effect would have been
improved by the temperate introduction of a neutral tint.
These windows have very rich jamb-shafts, which serve to
mitigate the prevailing sternness of the apse, whose conch
or semi-dome has a late painting.
Truly sumptuous are the white marble parcloses to the
chorus, which is contained within the eastern arm of the
cross and the second bay opening into the transepts. The
foliaged ornament in oblong panels of grey and red marble
is especially worthy of remark, and of equal beauty is the
wall on either side of the flight of four steps leading up
into the choir. It does not, however, rise beyond their
summit, the choir at this point being defended by low
grilles, composed of quatrefoils without circumscribing
circles.
naye towards its eastern end-are furnished with shutters
painted in a late style, with figures of bishops, and the “cul
de lampe,” or projecting gallery, in which the player sits, is
of wood, sumptuously carved and gilt. The central portion
of this gallery on either side bears a representation of the
celebrated Volto Santo, or figure of the Crucified, arrayed
in a subfuse-hued alb-like robe, confined at the waist by a
girdle, and with ample sleeves. The date on the southern
gallery is 1481, that on the northern, 1515.
In the transepts the vaulted roofs are painted in a
similar style to that of the nave, but in no part of the
church is the gallery over the pier arches vaulted, although
it is as lofty as the “ tribunes” of the north-eastern
French churches; the roofs being of wood and lean-to.
One of the most beautiful of the recumbent effigies in
Lucca Cathedral is that of Ilaria Guingi, daughter of
314
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
(TUINO
Carlo, Marchese del Gazetto, and wife of Paolo Guingi,
Lord of Lucca.
The work of the Sienese Della Quercia, it was executed
about the year 1414, and the winged boys, or putti, alter-
nating with festoons on the pedestal, indicate what a
strong hold the Revived Classical had on the mind of
the artist even at that date. The material of Ilaria Guingi's
effigy is Carrara marble, and the sculptor has represented
her quiet in death; the dog, emblem of fidelity, is at
her feet; winged boys adorn each side and end of the
plinth.
The rear side of the sarcophagus was removed later in
the fifteenth century, when the tomb was placed against
Uffizi Gallery and the Museo Nationale at Florence, but
was restored to its place in 1887.
The most prized relic of Lucca Cathedral is the “ Volto
Santo,” an antique wooden crucifix, said to have been
carved by Nicodemus, finished by an angel, and to be a
genuine likeness of the Divine Sufferer,
This relic, which suggested the favourite asseveration
of our Plantagenet kings—“ by the Saint Vult of Lucca!”
-is said to have been enshrined in the mother-church of
this city since the eighth century, though, according to one
account, first placed in the Church of San Frediano hence
one of the observances of the great festival (the Exalta-
tion of the Holy Cross, 14th September), a procession by
torchlight on the vigil when the Podestá and clergy used
to go for devotions, first to San Frediano and thence to
the Cathedral. There is, I believe, no room to doubt that
the antique crucifix was placed in the latter church by
Alexander II. at the time of the consecration.
315
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
This “Volto Santo,” in reality a work of the eleventh
century, is carved in two sorts of wood. Our Lord stands
on the Cross with arms outstretched, in the attitude of
ruling, not of crucifixion. The figure is robed in a long
imperial tunicle and mantle richly adorned with jewels,
but is only exposed for the veneration of the faithful
on three days in the year--namely, on the two festivals
of the Holy Cross-3rd May, the Invention, and 14th
September, the Exaltation and on the anniversary of the
cessation of a plague in Lucca in December.
After the person of our Lord began to be figured on
the cross, the first representation was of a body vested in
a colobium or white tunic from the neck to the foot. The
historical tradition, however, is vouched for by SS.
Ambrose and Augustine that, after the custom of the
Romans, He suffered, divested of clothing. Cahier and
Martin, in their Melanges Archæologiques (vol. ii. 59),
have given a noble figure of Our Lord so vested, probably
of the seventh or later centuries. In the eighth and fol.
lowing centuries He is frequently figured with a simple
cloth round the loins and descending to the knees (see
Cahier and Martin, Ibid, plates at end), which has con-
tinued to the present day.* Nevertheless the clothed or
semi-clothed form was usual until the fifteenth century
at the least. It is in the thirteenth and following centuries
that we first behold the figure with that scanty clothing
which afterwards became common.t
* See Seroux d’Agincourt, Atlas II., Plate X, et seg, from examples
in the catacombs.
f I noticed that on several of the roods suspended against the walls
of Italian churches the figure of Our Lord was decked similarly to the
Volto Santo at Lucca.
316
THE GOTHIC: LUCCA
D’Agincourt, in the second volume of his Atlas, has
engraved a number of crucifixes from the seventh century
downwards, wherein the body is thus girt round the loins
with an apron, from the loins to the knees, the arms
outstretched horizontally, the countenance looking
straight forward, the head upright, each of the feet
nailed separately and resting on a broad support or
platform of greater or less magnitude. SS. Mary and
John are often represented standing one on each side
gazing at the Sufferer, and sometimes with the two soldiers
and the centurion. The two thieves are almost invariably
omitted.
By the end of the thirteenth century the almost nude
figure, the drooping head and falling and crooked arms,
distorted body, feet nailed together without any support,
were introduced, such as is seen in the present day-a
fashion to be deprecated, as fit to excite compassion rather
An exact copy of the Volto Santo is always exposed in
the octagonal temple of Classical architecture under one
of the arches of the nave of Lucca Cathedral on the north
side. On one occasion of my enraptured visits to the
Duomo, I was contemplating this “very similitude” of
the Santo, when a little acolyte begged I would move, as
he wished to light some candles on the altar before it,
preparatory to some devotions which were about to take
place. The octagonal ædicula in which this precious relic
is enshrined, is a gracefully, though not appropriately, de-
signed work of Matteo Civitale, in the better Renaissance
of 1484, or thereabouts. .
I was unfortunately at Lucca only a few days too early
to have been present at the grand ceremonies which
317
THE CATHEDRALS OF CENTRAL ITALY
attend the Exposition of this treasure in December, but a
friend tells me that he once had an opportunity of witness-
ingallthe splendour of Lucchese worshipon 14th September,
and a pomp of decoration which, though prejudicial to the
purity of architectural character, had still a richly solemn
effect. He told me he should not forget that day at Lucca,
one of the most interesting, distinguished by the grand
celebrations of the Church and the entertainments of the
people in the cycle of Italian festivals. It sufficed to con-
vince him how strong is the fascination still exercised by
these anniversary fêtes of the Church, notwithstanding
all she has suffered under the country's government.
-
318
INDEX
Advent Sunday at Beauvais, 76
Alabaster, translucent, in windows at
Orvieto, 222
All Hallows-tide at Orvieto, 29
Ambrogio, San, Genoa, 12
Amiens Cathedral, procession in, 4
Andrea, San, Pistoja, carved pulpit in,
127
Andrea, San, Vercelli, 243
Angelico, Fra, 113, 118
Annunziata, Church of the, Florence,
119; Genoa, 11
Arezzo, 59; Cathedral, 59, 259-271
Arnolfo del Cambio, 272, 286
Assisi, 47, 238 ; San Francesco, 49, 241-
254; Cathedral, 255
Pisa, 18, 151-163; Pistoja, 176;
Siena, 25, 192-210; Spoleto, 43 ;
Viterbo, 35
Ceramic art, 80
Chiara, Sta, 251
Church music and services at Arezzo, 59 ;
Beauvais, 76; Cortona, 58; Florence,
62 ; Lucca, 74; Orvieto, 31; Perugia,
55; Pisa, 21; Siena, 27 .
Cimabue, 106
Cistercian churches, 187
Civitali, works by, at Lucca, 72, 311
Coloured materials used in Italian church
building, 25, 79, 146, 178, 281, 305
Columns and piers, 10, 146, 161, 200,
222, 261, 304
Como, Guido da, pulpit by, at Pistoja, 127
Cortona, 57
B
3
D
DONATELLO, 91, 141
BAPTISTERY at Florence, 272; Pisa,
Doorways, western, of Genoa Cathedral,
133, 164; Pistoja, 296; Siena, 208
147 ; of Lucca Cathedral, 302
Bartolommeo, Fra, 72, 74
Dorsal of the Baptistery at Florence, 273
Bartolommeo, San, Pistoja, carved pulpit
in, 127
Dyce, William, 233
Beauvais, Advent Sunday at, 76
Bell-cotes and Campanili, 14, 55, 170, 175,
220, 286
Façades, Assisi, 255; Florence, 284;
Benedict XI., tomb of, at Perugia, 136 Lucca, 169, 302, 305; Orvieto, 227;
Bologna, San Petronio, 184
Siena, 199; Spoleto, 43
Bolsena Miracle, the, 109, 212
Florence, 61; Cathedral, 61, 275-295;
Brunelleschi, 279
stained glass, 87, 289; Chapter Mass
Buonamico, sculpture by, at Groppoli and in, 62 ; view of city from Bello Sguardo,
Pisa, 126
64 ; art of, in fourteenth century, 136 ;
stained glass in Sta Maria Novella, 88;
с
Or San Michele, statuary of, 138
Fonts at Orvieto, 224; Pisa, 165; Siena,
CAMPANILI, 14, 170, 175, 286
209
Cathedrals, Arezzo, 59, 259-271; Assisi, Francesco, San, Assisi, 49, 241-254
255; Florence, 61, 275-295 ; Genoa, Francis, St, 48, 239, 252
145-149; Lucca, 74, 171, 301-318 ; | Frescoes at Assisi, 50, 244, 254 ; Florence,
Orvieto, 28, 210-232 ; Perugia, 53;! 118 ; Prato, 116; San Gemignano, 24.
2
319
INDEX
Gaddi, Angelo, paintings by, at Prato, 118 | Narni, 41
Gambasso, Livi di, 91, 292
Gates of the Baptistery, Florence, 274
Gemignano, San, 24
Genoa, 7 ; churches, 9; Sta Maria Carig.
Or San Michele, Florence, statuary on ex-
nano, 11; San Ambrogio, 12 ; Cathedral, 1
145-148
terior of, 138
Genoa to Pisa, 13
Ghiberti, 90, 138, 275
paintings in, 109-116 ; sculpture, 129,
Giotto, 107, 282
227 ; All Hallows - tide at, 29; the
Giovanni Fuorcivitas, San, Pistoja, carved
Campo Santo, 29
pulpit in, 130
Gothic, Italian, 182, 233
Groppoli, carved pulpit at, 125
Guingi, Ilaria, effigy of, at Lucca, 314 Painting, 96-120
Paris, reflections in, 6
Pavement of Siena Cathedral, 203
Perugia, 50; Cathedral, 53 ; service in,
Ilario, Ugolino, paintings by, at Orvieto,
109
Perugino, 51, 91
Incident, amusing, at Perugia, 56
Peter's, St, Rome, 39
Intarsio pavement at Siena, 195, 203
Piccolomini Library, at Siena, 207
Italian architecture, coloured materials
Pisa, Leaning Tower at, 14; churches, 20;
used in, 25, 79, 146, 178, 281, 305
Cathedral, 18, 151-163; Baptistery, 164
Italian church services, 21, 27, 30, 34, Pisani, the, 131
40, 55, 58, 59, 62, 76
Pisano, Andrea, 275; Giovanni, 127, 134;
Niccola, 131
Pistoja, 67, 172 ; architectural character-
istics of, 68; carved pulpits in churches
Last Judgment, by Signorelli, at Orvieto,
of, 127, 130 ; Cathedral, 175-178
III
Polychromy, Natural, of Italian churches,
Leaning Tower of Pisa, 14
25, 79, 146, 178, 281, 305
Lippi, Filippo, works by, at Prato, 116
Porta dei Servi, Florence Cathedral, 287
Lilcca, 71, 168, 299; Cathedral, 171, 301,
Prato Cathedral, 65; paintings in, 116
315; San Michele, 169.
Pulpits, carved, at Groppoli, 125 ; Pisa,
133, 165; Pistoja, 127, 130 ; Siena,
133, 203
Madonna, early representations of the,
101 ; della Misericordia at Lucca, 72
Madonna di San Brizio, paintings in chapel
Quercia, Jacopo della, 209
Madonna del Sacco, the, at Florence, 119
Marbles, use of, 25, 79, 146, 178, 281,
305
R
Marco, San, Florence, paintings in, 118
Maria degli Angeli, Sta, Assisi, 252 RELIQUARY of the Santissimo Corporale
Marseilles, William of, stained glass by, 86, at Orvieto, 231
Renaissance, the, 12, 187
Milan Cathedral, 186
Reredos, at Arezzo, 265
Montelupo, Baccio da, statuary by, at Romanesque, the, 142
Florence, 140
Rome, St Peter's, at, 39
Mosaic, 81, 156, 230, 273
Rosa, Şta, shrine of, at Viterbo, 36
M
92
320
INDEX
Salvatore, San, Spoleto, 45
Santissimo Corporale, Reliquary of, at
Orvieto, 231 ; paintings in the Chapel
of, 109
Sarto, Andrea del, 119
Scalza, works by, at Orvieto, 226
Sculpture, 121; at Florence, 137 ;
Groppoli, 125; Lucca, 302 ; Orvieto,
227 ; Pisa, 126; Pistoja, 127
Services, Church, at Arezzo, 59; Beauvais,
77 ; Cortana, 58 ; Florence, 62 ;
Orvieto, 31 ; St Peter's, 40 ; Pisa, 21;
Siena, 26
Terni, Falls of, 41
Terra-cotta and Ceramic work, 80
Thrasymene, Lake, 57
T'oscanella, 37
Tower, Leaning, at Pisa, 14
Tracery, Italian, 264, 309
Translucent alabaster, 222
Triforia, 146, 161, 308
Tuscany, the arts in, 83; Romanesque
architecture of, 17 ; sculpture of, 121
Vasari, 86, 92, 140
Vercelli, San Andrea, 243
Verrocchio, Andrea, 139
Viterbo, 34 -
of Lucca, 315
ISI
Siena, 25; SS. Simon and Jude's Day at,
26; Cathedral, 192-310
Signorelli, Luca, 110
Spolete Cathedral, 43 ; San Salvatore, 45
Stained Glass, 85; at Arezzo, 96, 268 ; |
Assisi, 49, 96, 245 ; Florence, 87,289;
Lucca, 96, 313; Pisa, 96; Perugia,
Western doorways of Genoa Cathedral,
147
Winston, Chas., 93
96; Prato, 96; Siena, 96, 201
Sta Maria Novella, Florence, stained-
glass in, 88
Street, George Edmund, 191, 244
Sunday in Beauvais, 76; Cortona, 58 ;
Lucca, 71; Pisa, 2 I
Susa, 75
COLSTONS LIMITED, PRINTEKS, EDINBURGH

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