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 jubé of this cathedral is fortunately still standing, and nearly in
all its original beauty. It is remarkable in its construction, having
three doors, beside the two recesses anciently filled with altars, and
there is a sort of aisle running round between the main pillars of the
choir and the screen of enclosure.
CATHÉDRALE D'AUTUN.
"Before the year 1765, the choir was enclosed by a fine screen of
mediæval design, but this was pulled down to make some pretended
improvements in the choir, and at the same time a most curious zodiac,
illustrating the seasons, &c., executed by a monk named Martin, at the
order of Bishop Stephen, which was found in mosaic in the pavement of
the choir, was totally destroyed, as well as several other objects of
the highest interest."—Chapuy, pp. 9 and 10.
CATHEDRALE DE SENLIS.
The ancient jubé was demolished during the revolution, and the present
screen is a miserable erection of _this century_. I have figured it as a
specimen of a _modern French screen_, combining every objection that has
been raised by the ambonoclasts of our days, without possessing any of
the beauties of the ancient works.
CATHEDRAL OF TOULOUSE.
This screen, which I have figured in the plates, was erected in the
seventeenth century, and though of debased Italian, is constructed with
a rood loft, or jubé, and surmounted by a large crucifix. This jubé is
still standing.
CHURCH OF S. SERNIN, TOULOUSE.
The choir of this church is enclosed by iron screens of remarkable
design and beautiful execution, figured in the plates.
They are evidently a work of the middle or latter part of the fifteenth
century. The lilies and leaves bent up out of the iron plates are
produced with wonderful skill. Some of the lateral chapels in the same
church have corresponding screen-work, and as Toulouse is a city
partaking much of the Spanish character in its buildings, streets, &c.,
I am inclined to think that it has also borrowed the design of this
screen-work from Spain; as Seville, Toledo, and other great churches,
have curious iron screens, reaching forty or fifty feet in height, and
of a very similar description of work. In the same plate with the
Toulouse iron-work, I have figured a screen from the cathedral of
Toledo, from which the great similarity of style may be readily
perceived.
CATHEDRAL OF AUCH.
The jubé was constructed during the early part of the sixteenth century,
in the style of the Renaissance, enriched with most elaborate arabesques
and details of the period, and provided with lateral altars. It is still
standing, although some attempts have been made by innovators to remove
it; but hitherto the canons have resolutely resisted all propositions
for ruining the ancient choir.
CATHEDRAL OF RODEZ, LANGUEDOC.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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