Page:Charles Moore--Development and Character of Gothic Architecture.djvu/293

Rh esque ornament appear—the interlacing patterns of mingled Byzantine and Norman origin, and the conventional Corinthianesque leafage. To these may be added a third, of less frequent occurrence after the beginning of the new style of architecture, consisting of figures and grotesque animals. The interlacing patterns, incapable of further and more living development, soon fell into disuse. The ornament consisting of figures and animals was also soon abandoned. But the Corinthianesque leafage naturally lent itself to those amplifications and transformations which the suggestions of nature soon prompted the French carvers to effect.

FIG. 176. The earliest remaining instances of ornament in which the influence of nature is apparent occur in the choirs of the Cathedrals of Noyon and Paris. The capitals of the great columns of the sanctuary of Noyon (Fig. 175) may not appear to exhibit a very striking likeness to nature in their broad and simple leaf-like forms; they are, indeed, but refinements upon a characteristic early Norman type, like Fig. 176, from the Abbaye-aux-Dames, in which the expression of nature is not strongly marked. But the qualities of line and surface, which render them superior to the Norman example, are qualities derived from nature. The vigorous curves and fine surface flexures which they exhibit are with-