Page:Charles Moore--Development and Character of Gothic Architecture.djvu/265

Rh that its general outline should possess an expression of strength—such as a more continuous slope, like that of the French profile, gives. The characteristic base of this epoch (Fig. 158) is equally far from showing a good form. It has none of that subtle relationship of parts which gives to the bases of the French Gothic their appropriate and beautiful character. The equal depths of the scotia and lower torus violate the laws of proportion, while the excessive projection of the upper torus gives an unpleasantly heavy effect.

I will not attempt to exhibit any considerable number of examples of capitals and other profiles of the mediaeval buildings of Germany. The distinctive peculiarities of these profiles were of late development, and do not come out with distinctness earlier than the middle of the thirteenth century. At this time in the choir of Cologne they appear fully developed. They depart widely from the best French models, though they recall in some degree the characteristics that were introduced in the declining Gothic of France, from which they are doubtless largely copied. But they even exaggerate the defects of the late French examples, and add new eccentricities that appear to be wholly German. Figure 159, a capital from the triforium of this choir, illustrates one of the most common types in which the bell is in reality little more than a continuation of the shaft itself. The true capital in this case is, indeed, largely the abacus alone. Whatever appearance of expansion there is below the abacus is mostly given by the sculpture. The astragal is in effect but a band about the shaft, and the sculptured