Page:History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 1.djvu/556

 524 FRENCH ARCHITECTURE. Pakt H. summit of its power. For a century after this it sustained itself by the imi^ulse thus given to it, and with scarcely an external sign of that weakness which betrayed itself in the rapidity with which the whole power of the nation crumbled to pieces under the first rude shock sustained in 1346 at Crecy from the hand of Edward III. More tlian a century of anarchy and confusion followed this great event, and perhaps the period of the English wars may be considered as the most disastrous of the whole history of France, as the previous two centuries had been the most brilliant. When she delivered herself from these troubles, she was no longer the same. The spirit of the Middle Ages had passed away. The simple faith and giant energy of the reio-ns of Philip Augustus and St. Louis were not to be foimd under Louis IX. and his inglorious successors. With the accession of Francis I. a new state of affairs succeeded, to the total obliteration of all that had gone before, at least in art. / The improvement of architecture, keeping pace exactly with the improved political condition of the land, began Avith Louis le Gros, and continued till the reign of Philip of Valois (1108 to 1328). It was during the two centuries comprised within this period that pointed architecture was invented, which became the style, not only of France, but of all Europe during the Middle Ages ; and is, ^x<r excellence, the (TOthic style of Europe, The cause of this pre-eminence is to be found ])artly in the accident of the superior power of the nation to which the style belonged at this critical period, but more to the artistic feelings of their race ; and also because the style was found the most fitted to carry out certain religious forms and decorative principles which were prevalent at the time, and which will be noted as we proceed. The style, therefore, with which this chapter is concerned is that which commenced with the Vniilding of the Abbey of St. Denis, by Suger, A.D. 1144, which culminated with the building of the Sainte Chapelle of Paris by St. Louis, 1244, and which received its greatest amount of finish at the completion of the choir'of St. Ouen at Kouen, by Mark d'Argent, in 1339. There are pointed arches to be found in the Central province, as well as all over France, before the time of the Abbe Suger ; but they are only the experiments of masons struggling with a constructive difficulty, and the pointed style continued to be practised for more than a century and a half after the completion of the choir of St. Ouen, but no longer in the pure and vigorous style of the earlier period. Subsequent to this it resembles more the efforts of a national style to accommodate itself to new tastes and new feelings, and to maintain itself by ill-suited arrangements against the innovation of a foreign style which was to supersede it, and the influence of which was felt long before its definite appearance. The sources from Avhich the ])oint(Ml arch was taken have been