THE RENAISSANCE IN ENGLAND, FLANDERS, FRANCE, GERMANY,
AND SPAIN.

In the foregoing sketch of the furniture, designs, and manufactures of central Italy, we have described the history of contemporaneous furniture throughout Europe. Pope Leo the tenth gave every encouragement to the reviving arts in Rome, and left that capital the great nursery of art down to our day. To Italy the great princes of Europe sent the most promising artists of their dominions, or encouraged such resort. Most of these men were architects and sculptors.

Classical learning and splendid living were both encouraged by Henry the eighth. He is, probably, to be credited with the impulse given to the court and the country in the direction of the arts and accomplishments of Italy. If Jean de Mabuse had been patronised by Henry the seventh, his successor offered tempting terms to Primaticcio to exchange the service of his brother king, Francis, for his own. Other artists, contemporaries of Raphael and his scholars, found their way to England; to these we must add the great master of the German or Swiss school, Holbein. That the artists both of Holbein's and of the Italian schools designed furniture in this country we have proofs in the drawing for a panelled chimney-piece now in the British museum, and the woodwork of King's college chapel in Cambridge. Another piece of furniture of this date, showing the mixed character of Italian and Holbeinesque design, is the very fine "Tudor" cabinet at South Kensington.

Though the court of Henry and the palaces of his wives were furnished with splendour, and works of art, especially those of the gold and silversmith, and jewellery, found their way from foreign parts to such great houses, the general manners of the country changed less in these respects than was the case in France and the more wealthy states and courts of Germany. In the portrait pictures of Henry and his family we see furniture of a renaissance character, but in the great monuments of the woodwork of the day the old style prevailed throughout the reign. The roofs, magnificent specimens of wood construction, were still subdivided, and supported by king posts, queen posts, hammer beams, arches connecting these portions and tracery panels in the spandrels, as in the two previous centuries. All parts were carved and coloured. The architecture of country houses began to change from the old form of a castle or a fortress to that of the beautiful and characteristic style to which we give the name of Tudor. Moats were retained, but still the principal features of the building were the depressed arches and perpendicular window mullions that had been long familiar in England, and were suggested by the wooden houses so general in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. The woodwork also and the panelling of halls and chambers retained the upright lines and mouldings forming the various "linen" patterns. Leafwork and heads, busts of the reigning princes, or of heroes such as the CÆsars, filled up the more ornamental sections, giving a certain classical element which was not fully developed till later: and most of the renaissance ornamentation of this reign has a Flemish rather than an Italian character. The woodcuts on the next page show a series of panels of different countries, many of which are to be found introduced with slight variations in English work of about the same period.

Flanders was in advance of this country in renaissance art. This remark extends to ornament of all kinds, whether of church woodwork, glass-painting, or domestic furniture. Still the Flemish work of this renaissance, or (speaking of England) this early Tudor period retains a mixture of details of the pointed style that makes us sometimes doubtful how to characterise the style of individual pieces. We may point to sideboards and chests in illustration. Belgium abounds in examples of this transition period.

In France, the most advanced and most luxurious and cultivated of the transalpine courts, the renaissance art had advanced far beyond that of England. Not only had Francis the first and the Medici princesses invited famous artists out of Italy, but they aimed at imitating Florentine luxuries and refinements as completely as they could. Admirable schools of ornamental art, such as that of the Limoges enamellers and carvers in ivory, were and had been long established in France. Classic sculpture was produced of great merit in all materials. Primaticcio and Cellini founded new schools of architects, painters, and sculptors in France. They employed pupils, and the most promising found their way to Rome and Florence, associated themselves with the great masters then practising, and brought back all the instruction they could obtain.

Jean Goujon stands at the head of these French masters. Besides being a sculptor and architect, there is little doubt of his having designed and even sculptured wood furniture. Probably the carved woodwork of the king's bedroom and adjoining rooms in the old Louvre are by his hand. Bachelier, of Toulouse, did the same, and pieces are attributed to him now in the Kensington Museum. Philibert de L'Orme was another artist in a similar field. Both Goujon and Bachelier showed the influence of the great Italian masters in their work. The table engraved (p. 81) is a very elegant example of French sixteenth century furniture.

The woodwork in the renaissance houses—the panelling and fittings of the rooms—was designed by the architect, and was full of quaint, sometimes extravagant imagery. For example, the architectural and decorative plates of Jacques Androuet du Cerceau will give some idea of the dependence of all these details on the architects of the day. This author published designs for marquetry or wood mosaics, as well as for all sorts of woodwork. A glance at the heavy cabinets of the later sixteenth century, of French origin, will show how completely great pieces of furniture fell into the same character of forms. Shelves are supported on grotesque figures, while in the mouldings, instead of simple running lines worked with the plane, as in fifteenth century woodwork, we see the egg and tongue, acanthus leaves, dentils and other members of classical architecture, constantly recurring. The ornaments of French woodworkers show a fondness for conventional bands or straps interspersed with figures and other ornaments. The panel, of which we give a woodcut, is French, and dated 1577. It contains armorial bearings and a monogram, said to be of the Aldine family. In 1577, however, Aldus Manutius the elder was dead, and his son did not live in France.

Germany and Spain took up the renaissance art in a still more Italian spirit than England or France. Parts of Italy as well as Spain were under the same ruler; they both, as far as regards art, felt the influence of powerful imperial patronage. We are only concerned with their art here as it refers to woodwork. German wood carvers were more quaint, minute, and redundant as to decoration. Something of the vigour, manliness, and inexhaustible sense of humour of the Germans characterises their woodwork, as it does other art, of which ornament forms the main feature. The well-known "Triumph of Maximilian," though a woodcut only, may be taken as a type of German treatment. The great cities of the empire are full of carved woodwork, house fronts, and gables. Timber was abundant. The imagery of the period, in wood as in stone, is intentionally quaint, contorted, humorous. It would be essentially ugly but for the inexhaustible fecundity of thought, allegory, and satire that pervades it. It should be added also that designers and architects had an immense sense of dignity, which we recognise immediately when we see their architectural compositions as a whole. Depths and hollows, points of light, prominences and relative retirement of parts in their arrangements of carved ornament, were matters thoroughly understood; and they succeed in imparting that general agreeableness which we call "effect" to the mind of the observers.

As regards Spanish art we cannot do better than adopt the statements of SeÑor J. F. RiaÑo, who says that "the brilliant epoch of sculpture in wood belongs to the sixteenth century, and was due to the great impulse it received from the works of Berruguete and Felipe de BorgoÑa. He was the chief promoter of the Italian style, and the choir of the cathedral of Toledo, where he worked so much, is the finest specimen of the kind in Spain. Toledo, Seville, and Valladolid were at that time great productive and artistic centres. As a specimen of wood carving of the Italian renaissance period, applied to an object of furniture, the magnificent wardrobe by Gregorio Pardo (1549) outside the chapter house at Toledo may be mentioned as one of the most beautiful things of its kind. These various styles of ornamentation were applied to the cabinets 'Bufetes' of such varied form and materials which were so much the fashion in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The most characteristic of Spain are such as are called 'VargueÑos.' These cabinets are decorated outside with fine ironwork, and inside with columns of bone painted and gilt. The other cabinets or escritoires belonging to that period, which are so frequently met with in Spain, were to a large extent imported from Germany and Italy, while others were made in Spain in imitation of these" (the italics are ours), "and as the copies were very similar it is difficult to classify them. It may be asserted, however, that cabinets of inlaid wood were made in great perfection in Spain at the end of the sixteenth century, for in a memorial written by a maker of tapestry, Pedro Gretierez, who worked for queen Isabella, he says, 'The escritoires and cabinets brought from Germany are worth 500, 600, and 700 reales each, and those of the same kind made in Spain by Spaniards are to be had for 250 and 300 reales.' Besides these inlaid cabinets others must have been made in the sixteenth century inlaid with silver. An edict was issued in 1594 prohibiting, with the utmost rigour, the making and selling of this kind of merchandise, in order not to increase the scarcity of silver. The edict says that 'no cabinets, desks, coffers, brasiers, shoes, tables, or other articles decorated with stamped, raised, carved, or plain silver, should be manufactured.'"