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Rh Bk. IV. Ch. IV. GELNHAUSEN. 45 cautious in judging of the age of any erection at that early time, from the style alone. No church in Germany is so classical in its details as this, but it will not do to rely on these alone for evidence of date ; for a hundred churches may have been built for one portal like this, and though ecclesiastical forms had become sacred, an arcliitect may have felt himself justified in resorting to any amount of Paganism in a semi-secular building. On the whole there seems little doubt but that this porch formed part of the monastic building dedicated in the presence of Charlemagne in 774. It may, however, have been erected by an Italian architect, and consequently be more classical in its details than if the product of some purely Teutonic artist. -=V?P 497. Arcade of the Palace at Oelnhauseii. (From Moller.) Its dimensions are inconsiderable, being only 31 ft. by 24. It has three arches in each face, and above them a series of pilasters support- ing straight-lined arches — if the expression may be used. These are interesting, as the same form is currently used in our Saxon arcliiteo ture, but never with such purely classical details as here. It is, ia fact, only the elegance of these that gives interest to this building. Nothing now remains of the palaces which Charlemagne built at Ingelheim or at Aix-la-Chapelle, nor of the residences of many of his successors, till we come to the period of the Hohenstaufens. Of their palaces at Gelnhausen and on the Wartburg enough remains to tell ua at least in what style and with what degree of taste they were erected, and the remains of the contemporary castle of Muenzenberg complete,