Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 9.djvu/234

 174 ON THE GEOMETRICAL PEEIOD OF preferred that the terms we use slioiikl not be altogether strange, and, if possible, self-explanatory. These two condi- tions are such as to render it difficult to find terms such as to be in all respects perfectly satisfactory, and perhaps no S3''stem of nomenclature could be framed so perfect as to be entirely free from objection. Until, however, a better be suggested, I propose to denominate these four periods as follows : — I. The Lancet Period. II. The Geometrical Period. III. The Curvilinear Period. IV. The Rectihnear Period. In thus adopting the term Geometrical, I should wish to be understood as using it in the conventional sense in which it has been applied by Mr. Rickman and his followers, and understood by all archa3ologists of the present day ; and the term Curmlinear, as conveying more satisfac- torily perhaps than any other word the undulating form both of the tracery and mouldings of this period, in which the curve of contra-flexure, or the ogee, as it is commonly called, is the characteristic feature. It remains still for me to fix the limits, in point of time, to be assigned to each of these periods. Mr. Rickman commenced his Early English Period with the year of our Lord 1189, and ended it with the year 1307, whilst his Decorated Period commences a.d. 1307, and ter- minates A.D. 1377. Or, in other words, he made his Early English Style coincide with the reigns of Richard I., John, Henry III., and Edward I. ; and his Decorated Style with those of Edward II. and Edward III. It is clear that an objection may be taken to this mode of making the duration of a style coincident with the life of a monarch, the death of the one having not the remotest connection with the close of the other. These dates, there- fore, are not to be looked upon as precisely and historically fixed by any particular architectural fact, but as indicating simply the time about which the style became changed. A preferable course appears to be to fix the commencement of a style by one or more examples of sufficient importance and of well authenticated date, or, where this is impossible, to fix it by the collective testimony aff"orded by buildings of au- thentic date somewhat earlier and somewhat later than that of the supposed change. In this manner, and upon evidence of this kind, I propose to fix the commencement of the Lancet Period at or about