The Transition.—At the close of the Norman period, the quality of the masonry was very good, and the workmen had learnt how to economise their materials. The improvement continued until the work reached a high degree of perfection. The mouldings, the ornament, the sculpture, and all other details are of a lighter style, and more highly finished. The architecture that remains of this period is aptly termed “Transitional.” The transition, from the round-arched Norman style, with its heavy and massive appearance, and its strongly-marked horizontal lines, to the graceful Early English style, with its prominent vertical lines, is very gradual, and the first step in this direction was the introduction to general use of the pointed arch. This is considered the most characteristic element of Gothic architecture—its ever-increasing use permitting the slenderness of proportion, lightness, and loftiness of effect to be carried out to a marvellous extent.

Professor Freeman has traced the adoption of the pointed arch in Western Europe to influence of Saracenic architecture, which was extended in the West through the Crusades.

In the early examples, the features and general characteristics of the buildings are, in the main, the same as in the Norman style, but with the pointed arch employed in place of the round-headed one.

Gothic Architecture.—This term was originally applied to the mediÆval styles at the time of the Renaissance. It was given as a term of contempt when it was the fashion to write Latin and to expect it to become the universal language.

English Gothic is usually divided into three periods or styles, viz.: Early English, Decorated, and Perpendicular, prevailing (approximately) during the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries respectively, although there was no strict division between them.

Early English Reigns of Richard I., John and Henry III. (A.D. 1189-1272).—The characteristics of this style as compared with the Norman are, “the comparative lightness of the structures, the long, narrow, lancet-shaped, pointed windows, the boldly projecting buttresses and pinnacles, the acute pitch of the roof, and generally the variety, the beauty of proportion, and the singular grace and vigour of the ornaments.”

Internally, we have pointed arches, supported on slender and lofty pillars. When the style had become fully established, the builders appear to have revelled in it even to exuberance and excess.

Church building had received a severe check in the reign of John, during the interdict of 16 years that rested upon the kingdom, but soon after the accession of Henry III., who was himself an enthusiast, architecture revived and developed very rapidly.

One of the chief characteristics of the Early English styles consists in the mouldings, in which a new principle was embodied. This was the idea of obtaining effective combinations of light and shade by means of “undercutting.” Such a combination of projecting rounds and deep hollows would present to the eye the appearance of alternate bands of light and shade, the depths of the hollows causing them to appear almost black.

The most characteristic ornament of this style is the “dog-tooth” or “tooth” ornament. (Pl. 34, Figs. 9 and 11.) It consists of a series of flowers, each of the four petals, bent backwards, the division between the petals being placed in the middle of the sides of the pyramid thus formed.

A very striking peculiarity is the foliage used in sculpture, which is technically known as “stiff-leaf foliage,” though the stiffness is in the stems rather than in the leaves. The latter take the form of a conventional three-lobed foliage. (Pl. 35, Fig. 1.) It copied no individual leaf, “though it has all the essential qualities of Nature.” Its use gives great richness of effect to the building, and is supposed to have been developed by gradual change from the Classical Orders, chiefly from the Ionic Volute.

The Crocket was also introduced as a new feature in this style. It is an ornament used to decorate the edges of the architectural units, and is supposed to be derived from the crook of a bishop’s pastoral staff. In fine Early English work the Abacus (Pl. 35, Fig. 1A) is circular, and is deeply undercut.

The Pillars are usually round or octagonal. They are built of large blocks of dressed stone, and so differ from the Norman pillars, which consisted of rubble with a facing of stone. In the more important buildings they are formed of four or more slender shafts of Purbeck marble, which are placed around a large circular column of stone, and their dark colour causes them to “stand out” against the paler central stone pier.

The Arches vary in form from a very blunt to a very sharp point, but they are generally acutely pointed, and are often richly moulded, as in Westminster Abbey. The mouldings, however, are the safest guide to the style, as the form of the pointed arch largely depends on convenience. As a rule, they are generally more acutely pointed in the cathedrals and large churches, whilst they are broader in small churches.

The Windows in earlier examples are plain, long, and narrow, with acutely pointed heads. They are frequently spoken of as “lancet-shaped.”

The earliest form is that of a single light, with arched head and without moulding of any kind, external or internal. (Pl. 34, Fig. 1.) Windows of four lights are occasionally met with, but generally they consist of three, five, or seven lights, rising in height to the central one. They are often included under an arched moulding called a “dripstone.” (Pl. 34, Figs. 2, 3, 4A.)

Square-headed windows are not uncommon, but sometimes in these cases there is an arch or a dripstone in the form of an arch over the window.

When two lights were combined under one arch, a blank space called a “tympanum” was left between the heads of the lights and the arch; but in time this space began to be pierced with another small light, generally in the form of a circle, a trefoil, or a quatrefoil, which both relieved the blank space and admitted more light. (Pl. 34, Fig. 3.) When this is done in the stone work, it is called plate tracery, and from this is developed the window tracery of later times.

The Normans were doubtful about their skill in making ceilings of stone to cover large spaces, and consequently they generally built timber roofs. Over small spaces, however, they erected stone ceilings or “vaults,” which were quite plain. In this period the vaults are distinguished by having ribs in the angles of the groins, with carved masses of foliage in stone, called bosses, at the intersection of the ribs. (Pl. 34, Fig. 5.)

The Buttresses (Pl. 35, Figs. 4, 5, and 6), instead of being merely flat strips of masonry, slightly projecting from the wall, as in the Norman Period, have now a bold projection, generally diminished upwards by stages, and terminate in a plain slope or a gable. By the use of this form of buttress it was possible to reduce the thickness of the wall. The corner of the building had a pair of buttresses at right angles to the wall, as if each wall had been continued beyond the point of junction—never one buttress placed diagonally, as in subsequent periods.

Flying Buttresses at this period became prominent features in large buildings. They are arches springing from the wall buttresses to the walls, and they carry off the weight and consequent “thrust” of the roof, over the central space, obliquely down to the external buttress, and so down to the ground.

The Roof was formed of timber, and was covered with the material most easily procurable in the district. A thatch of straw or reeds was probably the most common; shingles were procured where oak was plentiful, and slabs of stone and slate or tiles where they were obtainable. Lead was generally used only on very important buildings.

Spires were also often constructed of timber, and where the framework has become warped and twisted by the weather, we have a grotesque appearance, as in the twisted spire of Chesterfield.

PLATE 34.

(Fig. 1): Simple lancet window. (Fig. 2): A triple-lancet window from Warmington, in Northants (about A.D. 1230). The lights are placed under an arch or dripstone with the “eye” solid. (Fig. 3): A window of 103two lights, with a quatrefoil of plate tracery in the head, and a dripstone, terminated by the characteristic ornament called a “mask” or a “buckle,” from Charlton-on-Otmoor, Oxfordshire (about A.D. 1240). (Fig. 4): Five lancet windows under one arch, with the spandrils pierced, forming what are called the “eyes” of the window, from Irthlingborough, Northants (about A.D. 1280). (Fig. 5): Early English vault, groined, with moulded ribs on the groins only, from Salisbury Cathedral (about A.D. 1240). (Fig. 6): Pointed arch in the porch, from Barnack, Northants (about A.D. 1250). (Fig. 7): A trefoil-arched doorway. (Fig. 8): Characteristic Early English moulding (in section). (Fig. 9): “Dog-tooth” ornament in profile, showing how the name probably arose. (Fig. 10): A transitional tower and spire, from St. Denis, Sleaford, Lincolnshire. It shows a band of interlaced, round-headed arches, while in the belfry light it exhibits the pointed arch. The four corners are filled up with half-pyramids inclining from the angles. This angle-pyramid, which marks the transition from the square form of the tower to the pointed form of the spire, is known as the broach, and the “broach-spire” is quite the characteristic form assumed by the early stone spires in England. (Fig. 11): “Dog-tooth” ornament, front view. (Fig. 12): Door with “shouldered” arch, from Lutton, Huntingdonshire (about A.D. 1200).