Page:Charles Moore--Development and Character of Gothic Architecture.djvu/211

Rh Croce, passes entirely around the interior just below the springing of the vaults. The piers have the section shown in Fig. 103, of which the members a and b are the supports of the transverse and diagonal ribs from which they derive their sections. The vault supports are thus complete and continuous from the pavement, and this constitutes the principal merit of the design, which in other respects is not only far from Gothic in principle, but is, in some important points, singularly illogical. The want of logic is seen, for instance, in the elevation of the piers (Fig. 104). Not only are there no true bases or capitals to these piers—they being merely banded at the bases and at various levels above with groups of mouldings,—but the most prominent groups of these mouldings, those which take most nearly the forms of capitals, are situated neither at the springing of the great arches nor at the springing of the vaults. They are, on the contrary, placed at considerable distances below these points,—the piers rising through them to the springings, where they are again merely banded by smaller and more simple groups of mouldings. The vaulting arches are all pointed, but only the transverse and diagonal arches have functional ribs, the longitudinal arches being provided with mouldings only. These arches all spring from the same level, and the forms of the vaults are hence not at all Gothic. The arch sections are square, as is usual in Italy; and the pier arches are provided with hood moulds which break around the pier. These are, however, rather survivals of the top mouldings of the classic Roman archivolt than true hood moulds like those of the North. The openings are small everywhere. In the aisles and in the apses they are narrow lancets—one in each bay—and in the clerestory they are small circles. Notwithstanding that the building is vaulted throughout, and that the vaults are of very wide span, there are no external buttresses other than shallow pilasters. The lateral pressures are sustained by enormous strength of wall, aided by the usual iron ties. It is uncertain