Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 29.djvu/664

646 direction we have indicated, by raising the central portion of the building above the roof, in the form of a low, square tower. This served as a lantern for the admission of light. In the eleventh century, when the Norman period commenced, the upward tendency was much more marked. The buildings generally were more lofty, and the tower especially was heightened. The splaying of windows—a device evidently brought about by the desire to obtain the maximum of light through the narrow openings in thick walls—now became general. The early Norman buildings retain in general the Romanesque character of massiveness, but efforts to relieve this are apparent in the rich carving of doorways, the occasional wreathing or other decoration of heavy supporting pillars, and the use of light arcades for mere ornament. The circular section of the pillar is no longer strictly adhered to, but hexagonal and octagonal pillars are freely used, and sometimes four shafts are combined into one pillar, the commencement of the clustered form so conspicuous in later styles. But the most important invention of this period was the buttress, which rendered it possible to raise the height of a wall considerably without the necessity of adding uniformly to its thickness.

In the twelfth century architecture began to develop in well defined forms the peculiar character which we distinguish by the term Gothic. With the view, doubtless, of providing more effectually against the inclemency of northern climates, the pitch of the roof had been raised, until, at the time to which we refer, the ancient pediment had grown into the mediaeval gable. Another important change was the introduction of the pointed arch. Of the writers who have put forward their own particular views as to the origin of the pointed arch, it may be said their name is legion. The theory that it was suggested by the interlacing of the branching of trees is a pretty one, but, we fear, must be relegated to the domain of poetic fancy. It would have had more force if it could have been applied to classic architecture, and not to Gothic, as the worship in groves intimately connected with paganism, whereas the Christian religion is associated in its early days with caves and catacombs. The hypothesis that it is an importation from the East, one of the results of the Crusades, has much to be said in its favor. Pointed arches had long been used in Oriental buildings, and they are even found in Assyrian remains. The intersection of arches carried to alternate pillars in ornamental arcades—a form frequently met with in Norman buildings—produces a perfect pointed arch. But whatever was the immediate cause of the adoption of this form, it is an expression in a high degree of the principles which governed the development of the art in the middle ages. It marks a distinct advance in the pursuit of light, in all the three senses mentioned above. Not only is the central portion higher than that of a semicircular arch, but the construction is such as to suggest that the support of the pillar is carried upward through the