Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 11.djvu/349

 Notices of ^rtbacologttal ^Publications. ARCHITECTURAL STUDIES IN FRANCE, by the Rev. J. L. Petit, M.A., F.S.A. With Illustrations from drawings by the author and P. H. De la Motte. London : George Bell, 186 Fleet Street. Smail Folio. Among the many volumes illustrative of mediaeval architecture which have been published during the last few years, Mr. Petit's former works have been distinguished by the author's having treated the subject rather from an aesthetic than from an antiquarian point of view. In the splendid volume which he has just given to the public, and which is enriched with above 350 illustrations, the student of the principles of beauty in archi- tecture, the antiquary, and the practical architect, will all find matter highly deserving of their attention. To the first, the twelfth chapter, the appendix, and those free and bold sketches, in which Mr. Petit seeks to exhibit the character and leading principle of design rather than the details of a building ; to the second, the extensive series of examples of French architecture ranging from Roman times down to those of the Renaissance ; and to the last, the chapters on construction and the numerous accurately drawn details may be especially commended : each however will find much that is highly instructive in every part of the volume ; it is in fact a storehouse of the results of much careful observation which will be more highly appreciated the more it is studied. We have not space to enter into the many interesting subjects which this volume brings before us, and will therefore confine ourselves to noticing that portion of its contents which comes most within the province of an archctological journal, namely, the antiquarian. Mr. Petit's kindness having given us the opportunity of enriching our pages by transferring to them some of those excellent woodcuts with which his own are so profusely filled, and which, both for clearness of detail and for effect leave little to be desired, v,e propose to arrange them in an order somewhat more chrono- logical than the plan of his work has allowed, as by this means they may make some, though of course a very distant, approach to a series illustrative of the progress of French architecture, through some of the most peculiar and less known phases of its earlier period. An excellent starting-point for the history of French mediaeval archi- tecture is afforded by the entrance of a Roman amphitheatre at Bordeaux, called the Palais Gallien (See Woodcut, No. I), both as aftbrding an example of the ornamentation of stone masonry ' with brick, which appears to charac- terise the earlier buildings of France and some of the adjacent countries, and since, as Mr. Petit observes, it forms " a perfect Romanesque front 1 As at Reauvais in the Basse (Euvre it accompanies long and short work), and ol' the Cathedral, at Lyons, in the builiiing at Zurich, in a house in which it is alleged known as the Manccanteric, at Susa, in that (harleniagne lodged when on a visit the west doorway of the cathedral (where to that city.