Both these examples are surrounded by a curious dentil moulding which is found throughout St. Mark’s, and the origin of which must be sought for in St. Sophia at Constantinople, though it is better known as the Venetian dentil. There are, besides these, many smaller palaces and houses of the Gothic age, all more or less beautiful, and all presenting some detail or some happy arrangement well worthy of study, and usually more refined and more beautiful than those of the rude but picturesque dwellings of the burghers of Bruges or Nuremberg. The mixed Gothic style which we have been describing appears to have exerted a considerable effect on the subsequent palatial architecture of Venice, even after classical details had become generally fashionable. The arrangement of the façades remained nearly the same down to a very late period; and even when the so-called return to classical forms took place, many details of the previous style were here retained, which was not the case in any other part of Europe. Domestic work of similar character to that of Venice is found in some of the Dalmatian towns, and in the Islands of Quarnero. At Ragusa, in Dalmatia, is a palace built in 1430, according to Mr. Jackson, from the designs of Master Onofrio Giordani de la Cava, a Neapolitan, but altered and rebuilt by Michelozzo in 1464, after the fire and explosion in 1462. The arcade of the ground storey had originally pointed arches, but in the rebuilding these were replaced by circular arches, some of the earlier capitals being utilised in the later structure. Drawings are given in Mr. Jackson’s work. The courtyards of this palace and of the Sponza in the same town are interesting examples of domestic work. CHAPTER VIII. SICILY. CONTENTS. Population of Sicily—The Saracens—Buildings at Palermo—Cathedral of Monreale Cefalu—The Pointed Arch. THERE are few chapters of architectural history—at least among the shorter ones—more interesting, in various ways, than that which treats of the introduction of the pointed-arched style into Sicily, and its peculiar development there. The whole history is so easily understood, the style itself so distinct from any other, and at the same time so intrinsically beautiful, that it is of all the divisions of the subject the one best suited for a monograph, and so it seems to have been considered by many—Hittorff and Zanth,[5] the Duke of Serra di Falco,[6] and our own Gally Knight,[7] having chosen it for special illustration, so that in fact there are few European styles of which we have more complete information. Many of the points of its history are nevertheless still subjects of controversy, not from any inherent obscurity in the subject, but because it has been attempted to apply to it the rules and theories derived from the history of Northern art.