Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 14.djvu/281

 STAGEFYR

241

STAINED GLASS

direction of the learned and saintly Michael Witt- mann, the future auxiliarj- Bishop of Ratisbon, he prepared himself for the priesthood. After being ordained priest by Bishop Sailer at Ratisbon 22 June, 1827, he was occupied a few months in parochial work at the little village of Otzing in Lower B,a\-aria, whereupon he continued his theological studies at the Georgianum in Munich in November, 182S, and obtained the doctorate in theology in 1829. In 1830 he was "co-operator" at the Hospital of the Holy Ghost at Munich, in 1831 Privatdocenl for Old Testa- ment exegesis at the University of Munich, and in 1832 he succeeded Pruggmeyr as subregens of the Georgianum. In addition he was in 1833 appointed professo'^-extraordinar}' and in 1837 professor-ordi- nary' of exegesis at the university. In 1838 he became canon and in 1858 dean at the Cathedral of Augsburg. Stadler was well versed in all the branches of theology, but he was especially fond of linguistic studies. Besides having a perfect mastery of German, French, Italian, and English among the modern languages, he knew Latin, Greek, Hebrew, SjTiac, Arabian. Persian, Sanskrit, and in his later years he studied also Spanish and Polish. He is best known as the author of "VolLstiindiges Heiligen-Lexikon oder Lebensgeschichten aller Heiligen, Seligen u. a. aller Orte und aller Jahrhunderte, deren Andenken in dcr kath. Kirche gefeiert oder sonst geehrt wird" (Augs- burg, 1858-82). The work is alphabetically arranged and contains more lives than any other work of its kind. The "Acta Sanctorum" of the Bollandists, as far as they were finished, that is, to the end of October, were condensed into short sketches, but many new lives were introduced and newly discovered data were added to the lives contained in the "Acta". The work is rather popular than scientific and from a critical point of view leaves much to be desired. In the preparation of the first volume Stadler was assisted by Rev. Fr. J. Heim, while the second and the third volume contain contributions from several priests of the Diocese of Augsburg. Stadler died before the third volume was finished, lea\ang the writing of the last two volumes to Rev. J. R. Ginal, pastor of Zusmarshau.sen. Other works of Stadler are: a Hebrew-Jjatin lexicon (1831); "De identitate SapientiiE Veteris Testamenti et Verbi Novi Testa- menti", which sen-ed as his thesis for the doctorate (1829); and " Dis-sertatio super Joannem VIII, 25" (Munich, 1832).

H6rm.\sn in St.^dler's Heiligen-Leiikon, III. 6-10: Schmid, Geschichle des Georgianums (Munich, 1894). .306. .309; Pr.intl, Geschichie der Ludwig~Maximilians-Universit&t, II (Munich, 1872), 525.

Michael Ott. Stagefyr. .See Ferber, Nicholas.

Stained Glass, the popular name for the glass used in the making of coloured windows. The term is a misnomer, as stained glass is only one of the glasses so employed. It is more the result of a process than a glass per se, as it is produced by painting upon any glass, clear or coloured, with the oxide of silver, which penetrates the glass when subjected to heat and gives a yellow reaction. In building a coloured window a variety of glass can be used, but usually there is only one kind employed, \az.; pot-metal, a glass that is coloured throughout its substance while in a molten state. This is used either directly or after it has been toned, or ornamented, or made a background for a figure subject by painting the same upon it with vifrifiable pigments, fused to its surf .ace or in- corporated with its substance by means of heat. Nevertheless, although the word slained-gla&t is inaccurately used, usage h.as so fixed its erroneous meaning in the public mind that in all probability it will continue for all time to be applied in naming coloured windows and their glass.

I. Documentarj-, and, far more, monumental XIV.— 16

history, demonstrates that glass has been in use from the most remote ages; that the ancients were familiar with it; moreover, that its origin, or discovery, or invention is lost in the twilight of fables. In many cases where china and metal are now employed the ancients used glass: they blew, cast, and cut into it thousands of objects with which they furnished tombs and temples, palaces and private houses; and adorned their persons, their garments, and their buildings. It is indeed doubtful if there was any branch of the art of glass-making and the utihzation of its products that was not known to them, a fact proved by the fragments of innumerable articles found to-day in countless numbers among the ruins of Egypt, Chaldea, Phoenicia, Greece, and Rome. It is true, however, that the glazing of window openings with glass can- not be traced back beyond the year 306 B. c. At this early date in the Far East coloured windows were made by arranging small gem-like pieces of pot-metal in perforated wooden or stone panels. This kind of window, still in use in the Orient, found its most notable development after the advent of Christianity; but it was not until the birth of Gothic architecture, with its large window-openings, that the full value of glass as a transmitter of light and a polychromatic decorative material was fully appreciated. Gothic window-openings called for a filling strong enough to keep out the weather, yet transparent enough to admit the light ; on the other hand, as, in this form of architecture, the wall-spaces were necessarily small, the windows offered the only opportunity for the decorator's art in so far as it depended upon colour. As glass at that time was to be had only in small pieces, the glazier was compelled, in order to fill the window-openings, to make his lights a mosaic, that is a combination of pieces of gla.s.s of various sizes and colours worked to a given design by jilacing them in juxtaposition. These pieces of glass hail to be kept in place by some other material, and the best medium for the purpose was found to be load, ajiplied in strips made with lateral grooves for the reception of the edges of the glass.

The early windows were purely ornamental trans- parent mosaics; later, when figure subjects were por- trayed, the artist, on account of the limitations of the mosaic method, was compelled to use paint in order to get the proper effect, painting directly upon the glass with ordinary' transparent pigments; but as this was not durable, when exposed to atmospheric changes, he protected the painted portion by co\ering it with another piece of glass which was held in place by means of leads, and thus insured its preservation, at least as long as the superimposed glass remained intact. This imperfect method was not long in use before a great cfiscovery was made at Limoges in France, where a Venetian colony of glass-workers had settled as early as the year 979. The new pro- cess, which revolutionized the art, consisted in paint- ing with metallic pigments which could be fused into the glass, the painting being thus made as lasting as the glass itself. Not the first, but one of the first, to employ this permanent jiroccss of painting on glass to any considerable extent was the great twelfth- century promoter of all things ecciesiological, the Abbot Suger. Recognizing the value of the inven- tion, he caused the windows of the Church of St. Denis at Paris to be executed in this way, and they were so successful that picture-windows became there- after a necessary constituent of every ecclesiastical edifice.

The oldest painted picture-window that has sur- vived the action of time is one representing the A8cen.sion in the cathedral of Le Mans, which is be- lieved by many .antiquarians to be a work of the late eleventh century. The gl;iss composing it is vcrj- beautiful, more particularly the browns, which are rich in tone, the rubies, which are brilliant, streaked