A History of Architecture in All Countries, Volume 2, 3rd ed.: From the Earliest Times to the Present DayFergusson, James
History
A History of Architecture in All Countries, Volume 2, 3rd ed.: From the Earliest Times to the Present Day
Fergusson, James
Architecture -- History
It is extremely difficult, in a limited space, to give a clear account
of the Sicilian pointed style, owing to the fusion of the three styles
of which it is composed being far from complete or simultaneous over the
whole island, and there being no one edifice in which all three are
mixed in anything like equal proportions. Each division of the island,
in fact, retains a predilection for that style which characterised the
majority of its inhabitants. Thus Messina and the northern coast as far
as Cefalu remained Italian in the main, and the churches there have only
the smallest possible admixture of either Greek or Saracenic work. The
old parts of the Nunziatella at Messina might be found at Pisa, while
the cathedral there and at Cefalu would hardly be out of place in
Apulia, except indeed that Cefalu displays a certain early predilection
for pointed arches, and something of Greek feeling in the decoration of
the choir.
In like manner in Syracuse and the southern angle of the island the
Greek feeling prevails almost to the exclusion of the other two. In
Palermo, on the other hand, and the western parts, the architecture is
so strongly Saracenic that hardly any antiquary has yet been able to
admit the possibility of such buildings as the Cuba and Ziza having been
erected by the Norman kings. There is, however, little or no doubt that
the latter was built by William I. (1154-1169), and the other about the
same time, though by whom is not so clear. Both these buildings were
erected after a century of Norman dominion in the island: still the
Saracenic influence, so predominant in them, need not astonish us, when
we consider the immeasurable superiority of the Saracens in art and
civilisation, not only to their new rulers, but to all the other
inhabitants. It was therefore only natural that they should be employed
to provide for the Norman Counts such buildings as they alone had the
heart to erect and adorn.
A still more remarkable instance of the prevalence of Saracenic ideas is
represented in Woodcut No. 531, being the Church of San Giovanni degli
Eremiti at Palermo. Here we find a building erected beyond all doubt as
late as the year 1132, by King Roger, for the purposes of Christian
worship, which would in no respect, except the form of its tower, be out
of place as a mosque in the streets of Delhi or Cairo. In fact, were we
guided by architectural considerations alone, this church would have
more properly been described under the head of Saracenic than of
Christian architecture.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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