THE architecture of the Northern division of France is certainly the most interesting subject in the whole history of the Mediæval styles, inasmuch as it comprehends the origin and progress of that form of pointed architecture which in the 13th century extended from Paris as a centre to the remotest corners of Europe, pervading the whole of Germany, Britain, and even Spain and Italy. In these countries it generally obliterated their own peculiar styles, and usurped their places, so that it became the Gothic style _par eminence_, and the only one ordinarily understood under that name. It has gained this distinction, not perhaps so much from any inherent merit of its own, as because it was the only one of all the Mediæval styles which was carried beyond the simple rudiments of the art, and enjoyed the advantage of being perfected by a powerful and united people who had advanced beyond the first elements of civilised society. It is needless now to inquire whether the other styles might not have been made as perfect, or more so, had the same amount of talent and of time been bestowed upon them. All we can say is, that no other style was so carried out, and it is impossible to attempt it now; the pointed Gothic had therefore the opportunity which the others were deprived of, and became the prevalent style in Europe during the Middle Ages. Its history is, therefore, that to which attention must always be principally directed, and from which all lessons and all satisfactory reasoning on the subject must be principally derived. The great divisions into which the early history of the style naturally divides itself have already been pointed out. The great central province I have ventured to call the Frankish. It was there that the true Gothic pointed style was invented, and thence that it issued in the middle of the 12th century, first pervading the two great subordinate divisions of Normandy on the one hand, and Burgundy on the other. In Normandy, before this time, a warlike race had raised themselves to power, and, with an inconsistency characteristic of their state of civilisation, devoted to sacred purposes the wealth they had acquired by rapine and plunder, covering their province with churches, and perfecting a rude style of architecture singularly expressive of their bold and energetic character.