Page:The castellated and domestic architecture of Scotland from the twelfth to the eighteenth century (1887) - Volume 2.djvu/126

 FOURTH PERIOD 110 CRATHES CASTLE The upper floors have been a good deal altered,, but the original plan is still discernible. On the first floor the space over the two western cellars is occupied by the hall (30 feet by 18 feet 8 inches),, which has a semicircular vault ornamented with plaster panelling and carved stone pendants. Over the kitchen was the private room or with- drawing-room. The upper floors contain a large number of bedrooms, some of the ceilings of which show the joists and flooring of the rooms above,, and are painted with heads of emperors, kings of Israel, scrolls of texts of Scripture, etc. These paintings have been restored, but are still very interesting as illustrating the style of decoration in use at the time. On the top story there is a long gallery (Fig. 574) occupying the whole length of the house from east to west (the part over the kitchen and larder). It is 44 feet 10 inches long, by 13 feet 3 inches wide. The ceiling extends into the roof, the slope of which is seen on each side, and is finely panelled in oak. Such long galleries are not unusual in the castles of this period, and are frequently in the top story like this one ; but owing to the ruinous state of most of our old castles, com- paratively few have been preserved. Some examples, however, still exist, such as Pinkie, Earl's Hall, Culross, etc., but a roof panelled in oak like that of Crathes is quite unique in this country, although of common occurrence in England. Externally (Figs. 575 and 576), the castle presents, as at Craigievar, a wonderful cluster of pinnacles and turrets at the roof above a similarly plain building with rounded corners below. The corbelling and enrichments are here even of a more elaborate and ornate character than at Craigievar, the label moulding being conspicuous, as is usual in the North. Gargoyles at impossible places, applied as mere ornaments, also occur in profusion. The square turrets of the eastern gable (Fig. 576) present a striking example of how the gable was sometimes absorbed by these features. Owing to the peculiarity of the plan above referred to, the south gable (Fig. 575) is much wider than the others, and has therefore been roofed in with a double roof. It thus forms, as it were, a double gable, and the space between the two ridges is filled in with a balcony rising from a corbelled turret. This is an unusual but a very successful feature of the design. The main staircase, which occupies a peculiar position in the salient angle of the wing, after ascending three stories stops, and another stair- case is carried up to the roof in the projecting turret above referred to. In the east wall (Fig. 576), over the doorway, which still preserves its original iron " yett," are two shields, one containing the Burnett arms (impaled with those of Hamilton or Fraser), and the date 1553, the other the monogram of Alexander Burnett and Jean Gordon, his wife, with the date 1596. These dates probably indicate the time of com- mencement and completion of the castle.