Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/314

298 298 ITALIAN ARCHITECTURE. Part JL they became distinct and antagonistic nationalities, practising tw« styles of art, which had very little in common the one with the other. Whoever the Barbarians were who in the 5th and 6th centuries swarmed into Italy — Austro-Goths, Visi-Goths, or Lombards — they certainly did not belong to any of the great building races of the world. Few people ever had better opportunities than they of em- ploying their easily-acquired plunder in architectural magniticence, if they had any taste that way ; but, though we hear everywhere of the foundation of churches and the endowment of ecclesiastical establishments during the Carlovingian period, not one important edifice of that age has come down to our time. The monumental history of the Round Gothic style is as essentially a blank in Italy as it is in Saxon England. One or two circular buildings remain tolerably entire ; some small chapels let us into the secrets of the style, but not one important edifice of any sort attests the splendor of the Lombard kingdom of Northern Italy. Aryans they must have been, and it was not till the beginning of the 11th century, when their blood was thoroughly mixed with that of the indigenous inhabitants and a com- plete fusion of races had taken place, that we find buildings of a monumental character ei-ected, which ha^'e come down to the present day. Among the smaller monuments of the age none has been preserved more complete and less altered than the little chapel at Friuli ; which, though extremely small, (only 18 ft. by 30 inside the walls), is interesting, as retaining all its deco- rations almost exactly as they were left by Ger- trude, Duchess of Friuli, who erected it in the 8th century. It shows con- siderable elegance in its details, and the sculpture is far better than it afterwards became, though perhaps its most remarkable peculiarity is the intersecting vault that covers it — pulchre testudinatum, as the old chronicle terms Chapel at Friuli. (From Gailhabaud.)