Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/405

Rh bk. vui, ch. vn. ITALIAN BYZANTINE. 389 CHAPTER vn. ITALIAN BYZANTINE. CONTENTS. Cloister of St. Giovanni Laterano — St. Mark's, Venice — St. Antonio, Padua — Church at Molfetta — Baptistery, Mont St. Angelo — Tomb, Canosa. AS before mentioned, there is a great hiatus in our history of the arcliitecture of Italy in the dark ages. During the four cen- turies which elapsed from 600 to 1000, the examples are very few, and their character generally insignificant. It is true that during this ]>eriod Rome went on building large churches ; but it was in her own Romanesque manner, fitting together Roman pillars with classical details of more or less purity, but hardly, except in cloisters and furniture, deserving the name of a style. Perhajis the most original, as it certainly is one of the most beauti- ful things the Romans did, is the cloister of St. Giovanni Laterano. 820. Church of St. Giovanni Laterano. (From Rosengarten.) There the little arcades, supported by twisted columns, and adorned with mosaics, are as graceful and pleasing as anything of that class found elsewhere ; and as they are encased in a framework of sufficient strength to take off all apj^earance of mechanical weakness, their unconstructive forms are not unpleasing. The entablature, which is the ruling feature in the design, retains the classical arrangement in almost every detail, and in such purity as could only be found in Rome in the 12th century, when this cloister appears to have been erected ; but the style never extended beyond the limits of that city, and thus has little bearing on the thread of our narrative. When in the 11th century all the nations of Europe were seized with a desire to build large and permanent churches, we find the Italian architects producing at once a complete round-arched inter-