Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 2.djvu/513

Rh or COLOUR.] A II CHI TEC TUBE 455 and Romans, there has been none as to the fact that, at any rate, some introduction of colour was well-nigh invariable in their work. Mr Owen Jones s Apology for the Colouring of the Greek Court at the Crystal Palace con tains, in a small compass, quite sufficient evidence to show how strong is the ground of those who maintain the necessity of colour in classic buildings ; and equally valuable is the report, drawn up by the Committee of the Institute of British architects, on the colouring of the Elgin marbles, with Professor Faraday s analyses of portions of the coatings of marbles brought from several ancient buildings in Athens, upon all of which he makes it per fectly clear that colour was extensively and generally applied. Professor Semper of Berlin, in treating of the origin of architectural polychromy, proves that the Syrians, Persians, Egyptians, Chinese, Indians, Jews, Phoenicians, and Greeks all used colour in their architecture and sculp ture; and we may safely conclude, therefore, that there is no country which has been in any way remarkable f r its architectural monuments in which the necessity of the -om- bination has been ignored or forgotten. This statement is sufficient on the subject so far as it affects all ancient schools of art. If we turn to later times we shall discover in all the schools of mediaeval artists a still greater and more pronounced adhesion to the same principle. It seems, indeed, almost superfluous to say that there are most abundant evidences of the fact that the architects of the Middle Ages were seldom satisfied until they had covered their walls with colour ; in one place with that in which nature has been so lavish in marble and precious stones ; in another with the artificial tints of tiles and bricks; in another with the bright stencilling of gay diapers over entire walls ; or, lastly, in the teaching of Scripture story, or legend or history, by the aid of the greatest painters of the day. If we look for an instant to Italy we shall see what a lesson these artists have left us there. There is, for in stance, the Arena chapel at Padua, designed by Giotto, and then painted by him with his own hands in such fashion that, to the present day, this simple little room some 20 feet by 40 in its dimensions is one of the greatest pilgrim age places in Europe for all lovers of Christian art ; and again, in that far grander work the noble church so finely stationed on the steep slopes of the Apennines at Assisi we see how Cimabue, Siinoue Memmi, Giotto, and many others, helped to cover with pictures, conceived in a really divine spirit, the walls which would otherwise, no doubt, have been resplendent with the less artistic, but still most effective labours of the patient stonciller. The same lesson is taught if we look at the Campo Santo of Pisa, and see how Andrea Orcagna, that great architect, painter, sculptor, and poet, and beside him a succession of artists, among whom we count Buffalmacco, Simone Memmi, Giotto, and Benozzo Gozzoli, helped each in their turn in this illumina tion of architecture ; or at the church and refectory of Sta Croce, and the church and chapter-house of Sta Maria Novella, and the crypt of San Miniato, Florence ; or at that masterpiece of decorative art St Mark s at Venice where precious marbles and mosaics rich in gold and bright colour almost dazzle the eye with thsir magnificence, but combine to make an interior in which none can fail to admit that the effect of the mere architecture of the building has been extraordinarily enhanced. Nor was such practice as this peculiar to mediaeval artists; for the earlier Renaissance men had the same feeling in some degree, and Benozzo Gozzoli has shown us in his exquisite paintings in the chapel of the Riccardi Palace at Florence, and Perugino and Raffaelle in the Stanze of the Vatican, how their work might ba best adorned. But it was not only in Italy the land par excellence of colour that men had a true appreciation of its value. It need hardly be told how St Louis, in the palmiest days uf the French kingdom, covered the walls of the Sainte Chapelle of Paris with gold and colour and mosaic, and filled its windows with stained glass of the richest hues, so that to the present day it is an example of the most gor geous colouring it is possible to conceive ; or how, in England, when our monarchs wished to rival the zeal and enthusiasm of St Louis, they gave, in St Stephen s Chapel at Westminster, an example equally sumptuous and rich in colour; whilst at the same time, not only in our cathedrals, but in almost every parish church throughout our country, traces of more or less colouring are found to have existed over nearly the whole surface of the walls. Taking for granted, therefore, that every one will allow that it was, at any rate, the intention of all architects, as far as possible, to combine colour with form, it remains to be seen how this was accomplished. There were two great and distinct orders of architectural colourists, the constructional and the decorative. The first were those who built their walls partially or alto gether with coloured materials ; the second those who so built them that colour might afterwards be added, and with an especial view to its introduction. It is of the works of the former of these two classes that it is right to speak first, because the way in which they did their work was, on the whole, a more thoroughly enduring and proper way than that of the other school. It was also more definitely the work of architects. The works of the constructional school of architectural colourists must be subdivided into two classes : 1st, Those in which the coloured materials were part of the substance of the walls, and necessary for the stability of the whole fabric; and 2dly, Those in which the walls w r ere covered with decoration, such as mosaic, or tiles, or thin veneers of marble, which had nothing whatever to do with their structural requirements. The first class was that which was, on the whole, both the best and the most frequently adopted. The few examples which we see in this country, and, indeed, generally throughout the north of Europe, belong to it. The poverty of England in coloured stones or marbles will account sufficiently for the comparative rarity of the examples we can adduce. Among them are many of the Northamptonshire churches, as Irchester, Strixton, and St Peter s, Northampton, which are built with horizontal bands or courses of dark red and light stones used alter nately ; in other districts we find courses of stones and flint alternated, as in the church at Penton Mewsey, near Andover, and in a gateway at Rochester. In others flint and stone are used, but with inferior effect, in a regular chequer- work over the whole surface of the Avail. In the church standing close to the north side of Rochester Cathedral, a course of chequer-work in flint and stone is introduced under one string-course, and two courses of flint separated by one of stone under another. The churches of Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk abound in examples of tracery, and other devices formed by cutting out patterns in the stone, and filling hem in with carefully-cut and faced flints of very dark colour, so as to produce a very elaborate system of decoration in two tints. In the cloisters of Westmin ster Abbey the groining is executed in chalk, with occa sional lines of dark stone at regular intervals. Our red brick buildings are constantly diapered with patterns in black. The interiors of our churches, when not painted, were usually left with the natural colour of all the stono work whether wrought or not visible on the interior, an arrangement which, though rough and rugged in character, certainly gives a great amount of natural colour in a low