Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/545

Rh bk. I. ch. in. SPAIN. 529 it never had that accompaniment, hut was in reality only a basilica extended laterally, but on a small scale. The church of Sta. Maria la Blanca (Woodcuts Nos. 721, 722), described in a previous chapter, though built for another people, and for a different purpose, is still so essentially in the Saracenic style that it may fairly be taken as illustrating the progress which had been made in perfecting it up to its date in the 12th century. Another very interesting specimen of a Moorish mosque in Spain is that at Toledo, now known as the church of Cristo de la Luz. It is a small square building with four stout short i)illars on the floor, dividing it into nine equal compartments, the central one of which is cari-ied up higher than the others, and termi- nated by a sort of dome, if dome it can be called ; for the Spanish archi- tects, working almost wholly from Roman models, never adopted the Byzantine dome to any extent, except per- haps as the roofs of baths. In their mosques and palaces it is only used as an ornamental detail, and never con- structed either of stone or brickwork, but merely a carpentry framing cov- ered with stucco or mas- tic. The Spanish style shows in this a most essential difference froni the Eastern, where the domes are so splendid and durably constructed, and where they con- stitute the actual roofs of the buildings. Indeed, vaulting does not seem under any circumstance to have been an art to which the Spanish Arabs ever ])aid any attention. Almost all their roofs are of wood carved and painted, or of stucco, not used to imitate stone, but as a legitimate mode of ceiling, which it certainly is, and for fanciful and gorgeous decorations perhaps })referable to more durable but less manageable materials. The art resulting from such materials is, it is true, more ephemeral and must take a lower grade than that built up of materials that should last forever ; but such was not the aim of the gay and brilliant VOL. IT. — 34 974. Church of San Cristo de la Luz, Toledo. (From a Drawing by Girault de Prangey.)