Page:A history of architecture on the comparative method for the student, craftsman, and amateur.djvu/600

 542 COMPARATIVE ARCHITECTURE. common in the early work, as the Palacio de Monterey at Sala- manca. At Saragossa, the great cornices of the brick palaces are of wood, elaborately detailed. Internally the great saloons of the early period are remarkable, the walls, for ten or more feet in height, being of plain stonework, to be hung with draperies. c. Openings. — Doorways were emphasized (No. 236 a), and at Toledo they alone relieve the blank, narrow, walled streets. A special largeness of scale (No 239 a), was perhaps due to the importance of a gateway in oriental countries — a feature found in Spain owing to Saracenic influence. Windows were treated with well-designed grilles, and their dressings in stonework are frame-like in character (Nos. 235, 236 A and 239 d), small orders, resting on corbels, often carrying a highly ornamented head (No. 239 d), while the sill is often absent or untreated. D. Roofs. — These were generally flat or of low pitch. Towers, however, have spires of slate or leadwork of fanciful outline, even in designs of the severe Classic period, and the angle towers of the Escurial may be compared with the spire of S. Martin, Ludgate (London). Saloons sometimes have a light-arcaded internal gallery resting upon a great projecting wooden cornice, and reaching to the flat wooden coffered ceiling, affording a passage in front of the windows in the main wall, and detailed in a style suggestive of Arab influence, as in the " Audiencia" at Valencia. E. Columns. — In the early style, the orders were used in slight and fanciful decorative forms (Nos. 235, 236 and 237) ; the baluster shape, or shafts of an outline suggestive of the forms due to wood turned in a lathe, were used abundantly, being decorated in low relief. Columns in arcades sometimes had very high pedestals, from the top of which the arches spring. In the later work, Classic correctness prevailed until the outbreak of the Rococo period. F. Mouldings. — In early work, much refinement (No. 239) was given to forms due to Gothic and Moorish influences. A special feature is the bracket capital (Nos. 236 b and 237), by which the long bearings of stone architraves are relieved by corbels on either side, combined in treatment with the capital itself. In the middle period, the great number of breaks which occur in the entablatures mitred round columns (No. 235) give to the church interiors quite a special effect by the flutter of the many mitres. G. Ornament (No. 239). — Sculpture varies much in quality. Berruguete was the Donatello of the Spanish Renaissance, but his figures often are wanting in decorative treatment. Expression