Page:A history of architecture on the comparative method for the student, craftsman, and amateur.djvu/465

 ITALIAN GOTHIC. 407 reference to the slope of the roofs behind (No. 182); (c.) the great central circular window in the west front lighting the nave ; (d.) the flatness and comparative unimportance of the mouldings, their place being more than taken by the beautiful colored marbles with which the fagades were faced, and the broad surfaces covered with fresco decorations. There is an absence of pinnacles due to the unimportance of the buttresses, but the crowning cornice (No. 181), and the employment of elaborately carved projecting porches at the west end, the columns of which often rest on the backs of lions and other animals, are characteristic features. " Stern and sad (so rare the smiles Of sunlight) looked the Lombard piles ; Porch pillars on the lion resting, And sombre, old, colonnaded aisles." — Tennyson. Sculpture partakes of classical purity, and is in this respect superior to that exhibited in northern examples, but it enters far less into the general composition and meaning of the architecture. Corinthian capitals of modified form and the Roman acanthus were constantly used in Gothic buildings (No. 184). Mosaic was used externally in panels, in continuation of early ideas and practice. Terra-cotta and brickwork, in their plastic state rendered much ornament easy of application, and a smallness in detail followed, which was eminently suited to the material, as, for example, at the Frari Church at Venice and elsewhere. The treatment of moulded brickwork has never been carried to greater perfection than in North Italy during the Gothic and Early Renaissance period, especially in civic buildings, although the effect of sublimity is perhaps not to be obtained in so small a material unless used in the broad massive manner of the Romans. On the other hand, there is no beauty of detail or of design on a small scale that may not be obtained by the use of moulded bricks, which, if carefully burnt, are as durable as most kinds of stone. The Italian use of brickwork was essentially the right one ; the details were small and designed with taste, and the effect of variegated color was relied on instead of depth of shadow — a perfectly legitimate and expressive use of material where small and colored units are used. Stone of different color was also carried systematically in patterns through the design, giving a special character, as at Verona. A flatness and want of shadow is necessarily characteristic of brick buildings, sufficient projection not being obtainable for cornices, and this was always tolerated by the Italians, who allowed the material to express its own capabilities without trying to disturb its architectural function.