A Treatise on Chancel Screens and Rood Lofts: Their Antiquity, Use, and Symbolic SignificationPugin, Augustus Welby Northmore
History
A Treatise on Chancel Screens and Rood Lofts: Their Antiquity, Use, and Symbolic Signification
Pugin, Augustus Welby Northmore
Screens (Church decoration)
The screen of S. Mark has been so often depicted, that it has not been
thought necessary to give a plate for its illustration; but it is a very
fine example of an early Italian screen. Some writers have commonly
described it as Byzantine, but it differs entirely from Greek screens,
which are invariably solid, and entered by three doors; whereas that of
S. Mark is open above the subase, and has only one pair of doors in the
centre. It is a very remarkable work of the period, and decorated with
several marble images above the entablature, executed by early Pisan
sculptors. The images are of a much more recent date than the screen
itself, which is one of the most ancient and best preserved examples of
screens now remaining in Italy.
The church of Frairi, or Santa Maria Gloriosa, contains a very
remarkable choir screen, which I have figured among the plates. It is
composed of marble, and quite solid; the front is divided into
compartments representing the prophets, boldly designed, and carved in
bas-relief; at each end are the ambones for the Epistle and Gospel, with
an angel for the book-bearer.
Beneath the corbels which support these ambones are the four Evangelists
represented seated and writing the Gospels. The corbels themselves are
beautifully wrought with cherubims and angels. The choir stalls within
this screen are of elaborate Gothic-work, and ornamented with skilful
inlay. Altogether, this church is another most striking example, out of
multitudes of others, of the extreme fallacy and absurdity of the modern
notion that Pointed architecture is unsuited to Italy and the south; and
yet we hear this continually put forth in the most positive manner; and
instead of men importing the grand ideas and spirit of those Italian
artists who flourished in the mediæval era, we are inundated with the
wild eccentricities of Bernini, or the more insipid productions of an
even later school.
Not having visited Spain, I am not able to give any account of the
church fittings from personal observation, but I have had an opportunity
of inspecting several accurate drawings made on the spot, and from them
it appears that huge screens of ornamental iron-work, reaching to a vast
height, and elaborate in detail, are by no means uncommon. I have
figured one on a small scale from the cathedral of Toledo, and I have
little doubt that they greatly resemble the choir screens of St. Sernin
at Toulouse, which I have given to a larger scale. This city partakes
most strongly of a Spanish character, which strengthens my supposition
regarding the similarity of the screen-work.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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