Character of Renaissance Architecture E-Book

Charles Herbert Moore

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

The great change in ideas and ideals which, after the remarkable intellectual and artistic life of the Middle Ages, was manifested in the so-called Renaissance, is not always correctly conceived or fairly stated; and the character and merits of the Fine Arts of the Renaissance, as compared with those of mediæval times, have not, I think, been often set forth in an entirely true light. Of the merits of the best Italian art of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries there can be no question, but the belief that this art is altogether superior to that of the Middle Ages will not bear examination in the light of impartial comparison.
The Fine Arts are always an expression of the historical antecedents, the intellectual, moral, and material conditions, and the religious beliefs of the peoples and epochs to which they belong. They derive their whole character from these antecedents and conditions, and cannot be rightly understood or appreciated without reference to them. Thus a brief consideration of these conditions in the Middle Ages on the one hand, and in the period of the Renaissance on the other, may help us to understand the nature of the above-mentioned change, and to gain a more discriminating appreciation of the real character of the artistic productions of the latter epoch.

Leseprobe

CHARACTER OF

Renaissance Architecture

BY

CHARLES HERBERT MOORE

© 2023 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782385743604

CHARACTER OF

PREFACE

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV

CHAPTER XV

APPENDIX

INDEX

FOOTNOTES:

PREFACE

In the following attempt to set forth the true character of the architecture of the Renaissance I have endeavoured to reduce mere descriptions of buildings to a minimum, and to give graphic illustrations enough to make the discussions clear. The illustrations in the text are mainly from my own drawings, for the most part from photographs: but in a few cases I have reproduced woodcuts from the works of old writers, indicating, in each case, the source from which the cut is derived. The photogravure plates are from photographs by Alinari, Moscioni, Naya, Wilson, and Valentine. The right to reproduce and publish them has been obtained by purchase.

With the best intentions and the greatest care, it is almost inevitable that a writer on such a subject should make some mistakes, and I cannot affirm that no inexact statements will be found in these pages, but I believe that no fundamental errors occur.

I am again indebted to my almost life-long friend, Professor Charles Eliot Norton, for valuable criticism, and painstaking revision; but Professor Norton is not responsible for anything that I have said. I am indebted, also, to my publishers for their courteous compliance with my wishes as to the style and manufacture of the book, and to Mrs. Grace Walden for the care and thoroughness with which she has prepared the index.

Cambridge, Mass.,

October, 1905.

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

The great change in ideas and ideals which, after the remarkable intellectual and artistic life of the Middle Ages, was manifested in the so-called Renaissance, is not always correctly conceived or fairly stated; and the character and merits of the Fine Arts of the Renaissance, as compared with those of mediæval times, have not, I think, been often set forth in an entirely true light. Of the merits of the best Italian art of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries there can be no question, but the belief that this art is altogether superior to that of the Middle Ages will not bear examination in the light of impartial comparison.

The Fine Arts are always an expression of the historical antecedents, the intellectual, moral, and material conditions, and the religious beliefs of the peoples and epochs to which they belong. They derive their whole character from these antecedents and conditions, and cannot be rightly understood or appreciated without reference to them. Thus a brief consideration of these conditions in the Middle Ages on the one hand, and in the period of the Renaissance on the other, may help us to understand the nature of the above-mentioned change, and to gain a more discriminating appreciation of the real character of the artistic productions of the latter epoch.

During the Middle Ages ideas and imagination were governed by a religious faith which, though in many ways mistaken and misguided, was for the most part firm and unquestioning. Mediæval Christianity was a living power with the masses, and an inspiration to men of genius. The mediæval Christian mythology was well fitted to stimulate artistic invention, and the ideals which it maintained were full of beauty. It is true, indeed, that human conduct was not wholly governed by this faith; but the precepts of the Christian religion, as defined and interpreted by the Roman church, were generally held as of supreme authority, and to them most people acknowledged that they ought to conform. This Christianity gave the chief motive power for the best activities of the time, and the social relations of men were, in theory at least, based upon its teachings. The history of the Middle Ages abounds in evidence that popular habits of life were in many ways exemplary. Villani tells us that the citizens of Florence lived in sobriety and frugality, that they had loyal hearts, were faithful to one another, and that they required the same fidelity in the administration of public affairs.[1] Florence in the fourteenth century was alive with industry, and the open country around the city was prosperous with agriculture. Of such conditions her Fine Arts were an outgrowth and expression.

But the mediæval faith began at length to weaken. The church, as an ecclesiastical establishment, had grown corrupt and oppressive, so that men of spirit were moved to reject its dogmas and to resist its intellectual tyranny. Independent thought began to widen the range of ideas, and the reading of ancient authors gave a fresh incentive to philosophical speculation, and awakened a spirit of scientific investigation, as well as a taste for ancient poetry and mythology. The desire for intellectual freedom, and the thirst for new knowledge, which were thus stimulated in the fifteenth century constitute the good side of the Renaissance movement, the side which has hitherto been most emphasized by writers, and to which the modern world is indebted for a strong stimulus in the direction of some of its most fruitful activities.

But there were other conditions that must not be ignored if we would rightly understand the spirit of the Renaissance, by which the ideals and aims of this brilliant epoch were materially qualified and weakened. Influences were at the same time at work that were not in harmony with what was best. The humanist learning bred a Neo-pagan spirit which favoured and strengthened a growing indifference to moral principles and religious beliefs. The strong feeling of opposition to the church was in part due to this. In fact, the Renaissance was by no means an entirely noble movement in the interest of spiritual and intellectual emancipation, or an unqualified advance in ideas and attainments beyond those of the Middle Ages. With all of its abuses the church still stood for moral order and spiritual aspirations. The revolt against it was in part a revolt against both religion and morals. The animating spirit of the movement contained much that was unchristian and destructive of high ideals.

It is true that noble, and even pious, feelings survived in the minds of many men, especially during the early Renaissance time. Generous acts were still common among the merchant princes of Florence. In the early part of the fifteenth century the lives of Florentine patricians continued to be simple, and many of them recognized the responsibilities which their wealth imposed.[2] But toward the close of that century a different spirit prevailed. Luxury and extravagance took the place of plainer living, the pursuit of pleasure without regard to justice or morality engrossed the minds of men, and vice and crime flourished in high places until the prophetic denunciations of Savonarola were called down upon the wickedness and vanity of the upper classes.

Into the service of this luxurious and immoral life the Fine Arts were now called, and of the motives which animate such life they become largely an expression. The mediæval endeavour to embody the beauty of Christian ideals in works of art gave place to the desire to make the Fine Arts minister to sensuous pleasure and to mundane pride. In the height of its splendour the vicious life of Florence, the chief centre of literary and artistic productions, was appalling. Men now not only sought to escape from all forms of ecclesiastical and ascetic restraint; they went further, and freely proclaimed the sufficiency of intellectual, æsthetic, and sensuous enjoyments to satisfy the whole of man’s nature. They mistook the illusive pleasures of self-indulgence for the true joys of life. In abandoning himself to mundane pursuits and gratifications, the man of the Renaissance fancied that he got the utmost good out of this life, and took little thought of any other.

In a corresponding spirit the architect now set himself to the task of producing a luxurious and specious style of palatial architecture, drawing his inspiration from the monuments of imperial Rome, and the sculptor and the painter sought to portray physical beauty as the primary and sufficient end of their art. Their conceptions of this beauty were in part drawn from the remains of the art of classic antiquity that were then accessible. But the ancient works of art known at that time were not those of the best periods of ancient artistic culture. They were, for the most part, works of the decadent Greek schools as represented in Roman copies. Many of these have, indeed, a great deal of sensuous charm, and display much technical refinement; but they are wanting in the nobler qualities that characterize the finest arts of Greece. From the Roman copies of fauns, Apollos, and Venuses that had been preserved in Italy, it was impossible that high inspiration and true guidance should be drawn.

The Fine Arts of the Renaissance are in part a reflection of this decadent art of classic antiquity, and in part an expression of something quite different which was peculiar to the Italian genius at this time. To the man of the Renaissance the classic inspiration was necessarily different from what it had been to the man of antiquity. To the ancient Greek and Roman the pagan ideals had been real, and their inspiration was genuine; but to the Italian of the fifteenth century these ideals could not have the same meaning, or supply a true incentive. After the intervening centuries of Christian thought and experience it was impossible for men to approach the ancient themes in the spirit of the ancients. Thus the Neo-pagan Art of the Renaissance is not wholly spontaneous and sincere. It contains elements that are foreign to the pagan spirit, and not compatible with it. The art of the Renaissance is, in fact, an embodiment of heterogeneous ideas and conflicting aims.

Much has been said of the importance of the Renaissance movement in developing the individual man, and it is true that one of the most marked characteristics of the artistic productions of this time, as contrasted with those of the Middle Ages, is a distinctly individual, or personal, stamp. This is especially marked in architecture. Whereas before, and during, the Middle Ages in particular, architecture had been a communal art, the joint product of companies of men working together on traditional lines, with common aims and aspirations, it was now become very largely an expression of the personal tastes of individuals working independently of each other. The architects of the Renaissance were scholars and artists, newly acquainted with the Roman antique, animated with desire to appropriate what they apprehended of its principles, and at the same time ambitious to achieve personal fame. A building of the Renaissance is thus always the product of the fancy of a particular designer, as a building of the Middle Ages is not. But architecture of the highest excellence can hardly be produced by an individual working independently. The noblest architecture of the past has always been an evolution of a people, the joint product of many minds, and the natural expression of many conditions. The importance of the opportunity for the development of the individual opened by the Renaissance has been exaggerated, and the conditions conducive to such development which had existed before have been too much overlooked. We are apt to forget that the mediæval communal life stimulated the faculties of the individual in many noble ways, and we do not always enough consider that individuality may be exercised in harmful as well as in salutary directions. The individuality that had been developed by the institutions and the intellectual life of the Middle Ages was vastly different from that which was produced by the influences of the Renaissance, and it was in many ways more excellent. The individuality of the Middle Ages was obedient to the demands of corporate and coöperative life, while that of the Renaissance was independent and capricious. Conditions favourable to individual development had arisen early in the Middle Ages in connection with organized monastic life. The cultivation of literature, philosophy, and the Fine Arts in the monasteries had given considerable range to the exercise of individual powers,[3] though in limited directions, and the rise of the great communal organizations tended still further to stimulate an admirable individual development. But the individual of the Middle Ages felt himself a part of an organized body from which he derived moral support, and with which he felt that he must coöperate. It was the strong communal spirit, giving unity of purpose to the varied faculties of individuals, that made possible the production of the noble arts of the Middle Ages; and it is as the expression of this unity of purpose coördinating the fine artistic energies of the time, that these arts are preëminently notable. In so far as the development of the individual in the period of the Renaissance differed from that of the Middle Ages, it did so mainly in favouring individual caprice at the expense of harmonious collective effort. The capricious and irresponsible individuality of the time, together with the confused complexity of ideas and aims, gave rise to most of that which is open to criticism in the Fine Arts of the Renaissance.

Nearly all of the architects of this epoch were sculptors and painters. Few of them had ever had a thorough training in architectural design and construction, such as had been general with the members of the great mediæval building corporations; and hardly any of them were endowed with a natural aptitude for logical construction. The artistic genius of the Italian people has, in fact, always been essentially a genius for painting, and the painter’s habits of mind are constantly manifested in the Italian architecture of all epochs. This is especially noticeable in their use of the Orders, which is rarely based on any structural need, but is governed only by the fancy of the designer in seeking to produce a pleasant surface composition. Columns and pilasters, answering to nothing in the real structural scheme of a building, are disposed with no thought save for agreeable lines and rhythmical spacings. Thus they soon came to be used in many novel ways. They were set in pairs, stretched through several stories, embraced by pediments, and varied in countless fanciful ways. In this way the architecture of the Renaissance even more than that of imperial Rome, became a mere surface architecture differing fundamentally from all of the great architectural systems of ancient times, and of the Middle Ages. This is a consideration of capital importance of which too little account has been taken. The unqualified and short-sighted laudation of this architecture by the sophisticated writers of the sixteenth century has been too readily accepted, and a more discriminating judgment cannot fail to alter materially the esteem in which it has been held.

In surveying the history of architectural design with attention to its fundamental principles we shall find that there have thus far existed in Europe but three entirely consistent and distinctive styles; namely, the Greek, the Byzantine, and the Gothic. All other varieties of architecture may be broadly divided into two classes, the one consisting of buildings of transitional character, and comprising all organic and progressive types of Romanesque, and the other composed of styles made up of mixed elements not in process of organic fusion. The first architecture of the second class is that of imperial Rome with its off-shoots, the Christian Roman and the numerous subsequent forms of the basilican type, and the second is the architecture of the Renaissance. When, after studying the architecture of Greece, we come to examine that of Rome, we are at once struck by the incongruous mixture of elements which it exhibits; and although we may be impressed by its grandeur, we are unable to give it our unqualified admiration. In Byzantine art we find Greek, Roman, and Oriental elements, logically modified in adaptation to new uses, and fused into a radically new and distinctive style of entire consistency and great nobility.[4] In the transitional art of western Europe we see the creative genius of Northern races gradually evolving the Gothic style, in which elements derived from the older systems are wholly recreated and assimilated in a wonderful manner, and when we turn from the beauty, and the structural logic, of the consummate Gothic Art[5] to the architecture of the Renaissance, a similar contrast is again apparent.

In one branch of art, however, the best achievements of the Renaissance period command our unqualified admiration; namely, the art of painting. As before remarked, the Italian genius appears to have been primarily a genius for painting, and in this field the conditions all conspired to produce results that were without precedent for excellence, and that still remain unrivalled. Yet here, too, we shall need to discriminate. Italian painting of the sixteenth century presents a variety of phases that are by no means of equal merit, and the noblest forms of it show the least of the essentially Renaissance spirit. The Christian painters of the fourteenth century had laid a foundation on which their successors could build, and this gave a character to much of the art of the Early Renaissance which the dominant influences of the time itself could not give.[6] But the spirit of the sixteenth century was unfavourable to the highest ideals and the most exemplary practice, and, save for the works of a few exceptional men, there were no high achievements in painting after about 1520, except in Venice, where more than elsewhere natural and wholesome conditions had been maintained.

Among the many influences that were stirring the artistic minds of the Renaissance there were two of chief importance, the Neo-pagan revival, and the true intellectual life of the people which was independent of the retrospective movement, and had been growing up through the Middle Ages. The most sterling qualities of the artistic products of the period are due to this intellectual life, and Florentine and Venetian painting, the two most admirable phases of the supreme art of Italy, are the finest expression of this. In other words, it was not the revival of interest in ancient thought and feeling, nor the influence of classic models, so much as the ripened development of the native Italian genius itself, that produced what is most excellent in the Fine Arts of the Renaissance. A consciously retrospective motive can hardly be a vital force in artistic development, and the direct attempt, in so far as such attempt was made, to shape the arts after classic models was an unmixed evil. The native traditions and innate tendencies of the Italian people were enough of themselves to give a strong classic quality to their art. In architecture what of classic feeling was natural to them needed only in the fifteenth century to be freed from the elements which had been misappropriated from the mediæval art of the North to allow it true expression in forms adapted to their needs. In normal human progress each successive stage of development creates its own appropriate forms; but peoples, like individuals, sometimes pass through periods of partial aberration, and while genius may still find scope enough, as in the Renaissance, to produce much that is admirable, the noblest forms of art are not an outgrowth of such conditions.

CHAPTER II

THE DOME OF FLORENCE

The great dome of the cathedral of Florence marks the beginning of the Renaissance movement in architecture, though in its general form and structural character it has no likeness to ancient domes, and has few details drawn from the Roman classic source. It exhibits a wide departure from any previous forms of dome construction, and is an expression of the creative genius of a remarkably gifted man of great independence, working under inspiration drawn in part from ancient sources, in part from mediæval building traditions, and in still larger part from the new motives that were beginning to animate the artistic ambitions of the fifteenth century.

The dome of the Pantheon and the dome of St. Sophia, the two greatest domes of former times, had been built on principles that did not admit of much external effect, and the numerous smaller ones of the Middle Ages, in western Europe, had been equally inconspicuous externally, if not entirely hidden from view, in consequence of rising from within a drum which reached far above the springing level. In most cases the whole construction was covered with a timber roof, so that from the outside the existence of a dome would not be suspected. This was a secure mode of construction, and one that for stability could not be improved; but it did not give the imposing external effect that Brunelleschi sought.

Fig. 1.—Hagia Theotokos.

Fig. 2.—Aachen.

Attempts to make the dome a conspicuous external feature had indeed been made before Brunelleschi’s time. The later Byzantine builders had raised small domes on drums resting on pendentives, and rising above the main roof of the building, but they had still carried these drums up somewhat above the springing of the dome, and had further fortified them with buttresses built over the supporting piers, as in Hagia Theotokos of Constantinople (Fig. 1). Thus in such designs the dome still remains partly hidden from view, the drum being the most conspicuous part of the composition. Among the early domes of western Europe is that of Aachen (Fig. 2). In this case the drum is carried up far beyond the springing, and is covered with a timber roof which completely hides the dome from external view. The same adjustment of the dome to its drum is, with minor variations of form (the dome being in some cases polygonal on plan, as at Aachen, and in some cases hemispherical) found in most other mediæval domes, and the timber roof over all is likewise common. But in a few cases a different scheme was adopted in which the dome is set on the top of the drum instead of within it. In such cases, however, the drum is low, not rising above the ridge of the timber roof of the nave, and the dome, being unprovided with abutment, is insecure except in so far as it may have a form that is self-sustaining as to thrusts (which removes it from the true dome shape, or may be secured by some kind of binding chain.[7] An example of such a dome occurs on a small scale over the crossing of the cathedral of Pisa (Fig. 3). This dome is not hemispherical, its sides rise steeply, and with such moderate curvature as to render it measurably self-sustaining as to thrust.[8] Another instance of a similar scheme, and on a larger scale, is that which appears to have formed a part of Arnolfo’s design for the cathedral of Florence. This dome was never executed, and our knowledge of it is derived from the well-known fresco in the Spanish chapel of Santa Maria Novella.[9] Here both the dome and the drum are octagonal in conformity with the plan of the part of the building which it covers. The outline (Fig. 4) is slightly pointed, but the sides are nevertheless so much curved in elevation that a structure of this form would not stand without strong cinctures. It is, however, not unlikely that the fresco painter has given it a more bulging shape than Arnolfo intended. But domes of this character were exceptional in the Middle Ages. The builders of that epoch confined their practice for the most part to the safer form in which the vault is made to spring from within the drum, and is thus necessarily, either in part or entirely, hidden from external view.

Fig. 3.—Dome of Pisa.

Fig. 4.—Dome of Arnolfo.

Fig. 5.—Section of Baptistery.

A remarkable dome of this latter class is that of the Baptistery of Florence, which, though the building has undergone various superficial transformations since its original construction at an early, though uncertain, epoch, has come down to us in essential integrity. This building on plan is in the form of an octagon, and the dome is of corresponding shape, and sprung from a level far below the top of the enclosing walls. In elevation the dome (Fig. 5) has a pointed outline, and is covered by a pyramidal roof of stone the upper part of which is incorporated with the dome itself, while beneath the lower portion is a void between the dome and the enclosing wall. The structure has an internal anatomy that is both ingenious and admirable. The span is about 25 metres, and the wall at the level of the springing is over 3 metres thick. Above this the wall (_a_, Fig. 5) rises to a height of about 8 metres. The dome at its base is about 1 metre thick, and its extrados rises vertically to a height of about 2½ metres, leaving an open space between it and the wall of the enclosing drum of 1.26 metres in width. Above this vertical portion the extrados is stepped by several courses of masonry, somewhat after the manner of the dome of the Pantheon. From the reëntrant angles of the octagon (_a_, Fig. 6) solid abutments are built up against the salient angles of the vault, and, between these, two secondary abutments (_b_) are carried up against each of its sides. These buttresses are in the form of cross walls dividing the space on each side of the octagon into three compartments, and over each of these compartments a barrel vault, on an axis inclined in conformity with the slope of the roof, is turned. The upper ends of these vaults intersect on the surface of the dome, as shown in Figures 5 and 6. The voids between the crowns of these vaults and the buttresses are filled in with masonry so as to form the sloping planes of the roof below where it is incorporated with the dome, and on these are laid the slabs that form the external covering. With such an effective buttress system as is here provided it is hard to find a reason for the chain of timbers which is inserted at the haunch of the dome. The constructive principle embodied in this monument is altogether sound,[10] and its architectural character is in keeping with the construction.[11]

Fig. 6.—Dissection of the vault of the Baptistery.

Such were the models of mediæval dome building accessible to Brunelleschi when he was forming his great scheme for the covering of the octagon of the cathedral of Florence. But the idea of a low dome, or a hidden dome, could not meet the wishes of the Florentines of the fifteenth century. Their civic pride and large resources called for an imposing design which should make the dome a dominant architectural feature of their city. It was decided that it should be raised upon the top of a high drum, and the task to which Brunelleschi applied himself was to fulfil this requirement.

Of the vast and soaring dome which he succeeded in erecting many opinions have been held, but all beholders are impressed with its grandeur. It has been common to speak as if the master had been chiefly inspired by the ancient monuments of Rome, and had taken the Pantheon as his principal model.[12] But although he came to his task fresh from the study of the ancient Roman monuments, and undoubtedly had the Pantheon much in mind, yet the dome which he produced has little in common with that great achievement of imperial Roman constructive skill. In general it follows, though with great improvements as to outline and proportions, the scheme of Arnolfo as illustrated in the fresco of the Spanish Chapel; but the model to which it most closely conforms, notwithstanding the obvious and essential points of difference, is that of the Baptistery just described. There can, I think, be little question that this monument supplied the chief inspiration and guidance to both Arnolfo and Brunelleschi. A comparison will show that the dome of the cathedral, with its supporting drum, is, in fact, little other than a reproduction of the Baptistery of San Giovanni in a modified form, and enlarged proportions, raised over the crossing.

Plate I

DOME OF BRUNELLESCHI

Florence

Fig. 7.—System of the dome.

But while taking the scheme of the Baptistery as the basis of his own scheme, Brunelleschi was obliged to make some daring changes in order to give his design the external character which he sought. This great dome (Plate I), like that of the Baptistery, is octagonal in plan and pointed in elevation. It rises from the top of the octagonal drum, and consists of two nearly concentric shells of masonry, with an interval between them. Eight vast ribs of stone rise from the angles of the drum and converge on the curb of an opening at the crown. These ribs extend in depth through the whole thickness of the double vault and unite its two shells. Between each pair of these great ribs two lesser ones are inserted within the interval that divides the two shells, and nine arches of masonry, lying in planes normal to the curve, are sprung between the great ribs and pass through the lesser ones on each side of the polygon (Figs. 7 and 8), while a chain of heavy timbers (_a_, Fig. 8, and Fig. 9), in twenty-four sections clamped together at the ends with plates of iron, binds the whole system between the haunch and the springing. So much of the internal structure can be seen in the monument itself, but further details are described in Brunelleschi’s own account of what he intended to do.[13] From this we learn that the base of the dome, which was to be built solid to the height of 5¼ braccia, was to consist of six courses of long blocks of hard stone (_macigno_) clamped with tinned iron and upon this were to be chains of iron.[14] Mention is also made of a chain of iron over the timber chain (“in su dette quercie una catena di ferro”); but no such chain is visible in the monument, and if it exists, it must be embedded in the masonry of the vault, like the chains at the base.

Fig. 8.—Section.

Fig. 9.—Part Plan.

It will thus be seen that while Brunelleschi’s scheme is essentially different from that of the Baptistery, its structural system is little more than an ingenious modification of it. The parts of the one answer to those of the other with singular completeness. The attic wall and pyramidal roof of San Giovanni are transformed into the external shell of the cathedral dome, the angle buttresses of the older monument become the great angle ribs of Brunelleschi’s vault. The intermediate abutments of the Baptistery are changed into the intermediate ribs of the great dome, and the inclined barrel vaults of the Baptistery scheme are represented in the cathedral dome by the arches sprung between the great angle ribs.

It has been thought by some writers that the rib system of the dome of Florence gives the structure a somewhat Gothic character, and it is sometimes called a Gothic dome.[15] But there can be no such thing as a Gothic dome. It is impossible for a dome of any kind to have the character of a Gothic vault. The difference between the two is fundamental. A Gothic vault is a vault of concentrated thrusts, and it requires effective concentrated abutments. A dome is a vault of continuous thrust, and for sound construction it requires continuous abutments, as in the Pantheon. Whatever use the ribs of Brunelleschi’s vault may have, they do not, and cannot, perform the function of the ribs in Gothic vaulting. Their use is to strengthen the angles of the dome, and to augment its power of resistance to the weight of the lantern which crowns it. They do not support the vault as the ribs of a Gothic vault do. Being composed of very deep voussoirs, they have more strength to withstand thrusts, as well as to bear crushing weight, than the enclosing shells have, and thus to some extent they may hold these shells in. But it appears plain that the architect did not feel confidence in their power to perform this function without reënforcement by a chain, or chains, which, in his own words, “bind the ribs and hold the vault in” (che leghino i detti sproni e cingano la volta dentro). However this may be, the ribs of a dome cannot have any function like that of the ribs in Gothic vaulting. The shell of a Gothic vault is not held in by the ribs, nor is it in any way incorporated with them. Both shell and ribs are held in by the buttresses. This point will be considered further in connection with the dome of St. Peter’s.

The whole scheme of this dome was a daring innovation of one man, and in this it differs from former architectural innovations, which were the comparatively slow outcome of corporate endeavour, progressive changes being so gradual that no wide or sudden departures from habitual modes of building were made at any one time, or by any one person.

It was a prodigious undertaking. The span of the dome is nearly a hundred and forty feet, the springing level is a hundred and seventy-five feet above the pavement, and the height of the dome itself, exclusive of the lantern, is about a hundred and twenty feet. Such a project might well appall the most courageous of building committees, and we need not wonder that the Board of Works drew back in dismay when it was first laid before them.[16]

The successful accomplishment of the work, and the stability which it has thus far maintained, show that the architect was a constructor of great ability,[17] and the fact that he managed to raise the vast fabric without the use of the ponderous and costly kind of centring that had been commonly employed in vaulting, makes the achievement still more remarkable. The precise manner in which he did this is not clear, but of the fact there appears no question.[18]

The dome of Florence is indeed a remarkable piece of construction, and it is no less remarkable as a work of art. In beauty of outline it has not, I think, been approached by any of the later elevated domes of which it is the parent. Yet with all of its mechanical and artistic merit, the scheme is fundamentally false in principle, since it involves a departure from sound methods of dome construction. A bulging thin shell of masonry on a large scale cannot be made secure without abutment, much less can such a shell sustain the weight of a heavy stone structure like the lantern of this monument, without resort to the extraneous means of binding chains. A builder having proper regard for true principles of construction in stone masonry would not undertake such a work. For although it may be possible to give the dome a shape that will be measurably self-sustaining as to thrusts, as Brunelleschi clearly strove to do,[19] it is not possible to make it entirely so, and therefore if deprived of abutment it must be bound with chains. But a structure of masonry which depends for stability on binding chains is one of inherent weakness, and thus of false character.[20]

From these considerations it appears to me that Brunelleschi led the way in a wrong direction, notwithstanding the nobility of his achievement from many points of view. And in following his example modern designers of elevated domes have wandered still farther, as we shall see, from the true path of monumental art.

Moreover, when we consider that a dome set within its drum is not only stronger, but that it is also much better for interior effect, the dome of the Pantheon still remaining the grandest and most impressive arched ceiling of its kind in the world, the unbuttressed modern domes, with their manifold extraneous and hidden devices for security, appear still less defensible.

But in the architectural thought of the Renaissance little heed was given to structural propriety or structural expression, and the Italian writers, who have largely shaped our modern architectural ideas, have not only failed to recognize the inherent weakness of such a building as the dome of Florence, but have even considered the work praiseworthy on account of those very characteristics which make it weak. Thus Sgrilli lauds Brunelleschi for having had the “hardihood to raise to such a height the greatest cupola which until its time had ever been seen, upon a base without any abutments, a thing that had not before been done by any one.”[21] And Milizia says, “It is worthy of special notice that in the construction of this cupola there are no visible abutments.”[22]

As to the permanent stability of this dome various opinions have been held by the experts among the older writers.[23] Its form is, as we have seen, as favourable to stability as it would be possible to make that of any vault which could be properly called a dome. It appears to the inexperienced eye as stable as a crest of the Apennines. Every precaution as to material and careful workmanship seems to have been taken to make it secure. The wall of the drum on which it rests is five metres in thickness, and the solid base of the dome itself is built, if the architect’s scheme was carried out as he had stated it before the Board of Works, of large blocks of hard stone, thoroughly bonded and clamped with iron. The lower system is sufficiently strong, and appears to rest on a solid foundation. But nevertheless there are ruptures in various parts of the structure which have caused apprehensions of danger,[24] and its future duration must be regarded as uncertain. The writers who have maintained that it is secure have argued on the assumption that the parts of a dome all tend toward the centre.[25] These writers overlook the fact that the force of gravity above, especially when the dome is heavily weighed by a lantern, neutralizes the inward tendency of the lower parts and causes a tendency in those parts to movement in the opposite direction. This neutralizing force is lessened by giving the dome a pointed form, as Brunelleschi has done, but, as before remarked (p. 22), it can hardly be overcome entirely so long as any real dome shape is preserved.[26]

It may be thought that the object which Brunelleschi had in view, of producing a vast dome that should be an imposing feature of the cathedral externally, justifies the unsound method of construction to which he resorted (the only method by which the effect that he sought could be attained). But structural integrity is, I think, so fundamental a prerequisite of good architecture that in so far as this gifted Florentine was obliged to ignore sound principles of construction in order to attain an end not compatible with such principles, the result cannot be properly considered as an entirely noble and exemplary work of art, however much beauty and impressiveness it may have.

The example set by Brunelleschi was, in point of construction, a pernicious one, and bore fruit of a still more objectionable character in the works of other gifted men less scrupulous than he, and less endowed with mechanical ingenuity, as we shall see farther on.

Though there is nothing whatever of classic Roman character in this great dome, the lantern which crowns it, built from Brunelleschi’s design after his death, has classic details curiously mingled with mediæval forms. Its eight piers are adorned with fluted Corinthian pilasters surmounted by an entablature, while the jambs of the openings have engaged columns carrying arches beneath the entablature in ancient Roman fashion. From the entablature rises a low spire with finials set about its base, and flying buttresses, adorned with classic details, are set against the piers. None of the classic details have any true classic character, nor has the ornamental carving, with which the composition is enriched, any particular excellence either of design or execution. But these details are invisible from the ground, and in its general form and proportions the lantern makes an admirable crowning feature of this finest of Renaissance domes.

CHAPTER III

CHURCH ARCHITECTURE OF THE FLORENTINE RENAISSANCE

No other work by Brunelleschi is comparable in merit to the great dome of the cathedral. None of his other opportunities were such as to call forth his best powers, which appear to have required great magnitude to bring them into full play. In his other works the influence of his Roman studies is more manifest, and his own genius is less apparent. In these other works he revives the use of the orders, and employs them in modes which for incongruity surpass anything that imperial Roman taste had devised.

Fig. 10.—Plan of the chapel of the Pazzi.

Fig. 11.—Section of vault of the Pazzi chapel.

The first of these works is the small chapel of the Pazzi in the cloister of Santa Croce. It is a simple rectangle on plan (Fig. 10), with a square sanctuary on the short axis, and a porch across the front. The central area is covered with a circular vault which by most writers is called a dome, but it is not a dome; it is a vault of essentially Gothic form, like two early Gothic apse vaults joined together (Fig. 11). It rests on pendentives, and is enclosed by a cylindrical drum, which forms an effective, though not a logical, abutment to its thrusts, and is covered with a low-pitched roof of masonry having a slightly curved outline. Whether this external covering is connected with the vaulting in any way above where it parts from the crowns of the vault cells it is impossible to discover, because there is no way of access to the open space between the two parts. Through a small opening in the outer shell, near its crown, the hand may be thrust into the void, but nothing can be reached. It is a curious form of double vault, and differs fundamentally from the great double dome of the cathedral. The scheme as a whole is structurally inconsistent; for while the inner vault has the concentrated thrusts of Gothic construction, these thrusts are met by the enclosing drum, and not by the isolated abutments that the vault logically calls for. The sanctuary has a small hemispherical dome on pendentives, and the portico is covered with a barrel vault bisected by another small dome on pendentives.

Fig. 12.—Interior of the Pazzi chapel.

The architectural treatment of the interior (Fig. 12) exhibits a wide departure from that of any previous type of design. The form of the building is mediæval, being, with exception of the central vault, essentially Byzantine,[27] but the details are classic Roman, and consist of a shallow order of fluted Corinthian pilasters with the entablature at the level of the vaulting imposts. In such a building, however, and used in this way, a classic order is out of place; for an order is a structural system designed for structural use, but the order here has no more structural function than if it were merely painted on the walls. It is used, of course, with a purely ornamental motive, but as ornament it is inappropriate. A proper ornamental treatment of such an interior would be either by marble incrusting, mosaic, or fresco, or else by pilaster strips, or colonnettes, and blind arches, which would break the monotony of the broad wall surfaces without suggesting an architectural system foreign to the character of the building. Such arcading would have an appropriate structural suggestiveness, if not an actual structural use; but a classic order is unsuitable for a building of mediæval character. The mediæval pilaster strip and blind arcade were designed for this use, and they have the further advantage that their proportions may be indefinitely varied to meet varied needs, as the proportions of the classic orders may not. But in their lack of a true sense of structural expression, and in their eagerness to revive the use of classic forms, the designers of the Renaissance failed to consider these things.

A particularly awkward result of this improper use of an order is that the entablature passes through the arch imposts, making an irrational structural combination. This scheme was, however, extensively followed in the subsequent architecture of the Renaissance, but it is a barbarism for which no authority can, I believe, be found in ancient Roman design.[28] The nearest approach to it in Roman art is the entablature block resting on the capital (as in the great hall of the Baths of Caracalla), which was a blundering device of the later Roman architects. The complete entablature running through the impost, as in the chapel of the Pazzi, sometimes, indeed, occurs in the early churches of Rome and elsewhere,[29] as a result of unsettled conditions of design, while the architects were struggling with the traditional use of the entablature and the introduction of the arch sprung from the columns. But after the admirable logic of the mediæval arched systems of construction had been reached it appears strange that any designer should go back to this irrational combination.

Fig. 13.—Façade of the Pazzi chapel.

In the portico (Fig. 13) the incongruities of design are of a still graver nature because they involve weakness of construction. The order of the interior is, as we have just seen, but a simulated order, and has no structural function, but in the portico a real Corinthian order is made to carry the barrel vault and dome above mentioned, and an attic wall which encloses the vaulting. But a classic order was never intended for such use, and cannot properly perform it. Such an order is adapted only to the support of crushing weight, and has no power of resistance to the thrusts of vaulting. The weight of the attic wall tends, indeed, in some measure to neutralize the force of the vault thrust, but this is not enough to render the structure secure, and unless the order were effectively steadied by some extraneous means the attic load would constitute a source of danger, as with any disturbance of its equilibrium by thrust its weight would hasten the overthrow of the system. How it is actually maintained is not apparent. No tie rods are visible beneath the vault, such as are common in Italian vaulted structures, which are rarely buttressed in an effective manner. Ties or clamps may, however, be concealed within the attic, though they would be less effective so placed. But in whatever way the system is held together, it is bad architecture, because the parts have no proper adaptation to their functions.

The ornamental treatment of the attic wall is worthy of notice. The surface is divided into panels by diminutive pilasters, and these panels are subdivided by mouldings in a manner which recalls the treatment of the attic of the Baptistery. The coupling of the pilasters was an innovation in the use of classic members, but it enabled the architect to avoid unpleasant proportions in these details. Single pilasters of the same magnitude would be too slender for the deep entablature over them, or to harmonize with the great Corinthian order below, while wider single ones would be stumpy and inelegant. The pair give good proportion in the total composition, while each pilaster is well proportioned in itself. Another noticeable point is the manner in which the central archivolt and the archivolts spanning the ends of the porch intersect the pilasters at the springing. This could not be avoided, because the pilasters cover the whole space on the entablature over the capitals of the columns, and leave no place for the archivolts. Thus the mediæval principle of interpenetration is carried over into the neo-classic design.

It should be observed that the details of this attic are wrought in stucco, so that we have with the beginning of the Renaissance a revival of a common ancient Roman practice of architectural deceit. The great order, however, is necessarily of stone, and its general proportions are good, though the details are poor in design, and coarse in execution.[30]

Fig. 14.—Badia of Fiesole.