The early square towers of Romanesque churches were sometimes surmounted by pyramidal roofs of low pitch. We have probably none now remaining, but we have some examples of large pinnacles, crowned with pyramids, which show what the shape must have been. They were square in plan and somewhat steep in slope. The spire was developed early in the E. E. period. It was octagonal in plan, and the four sides which coincided with the faces of the tower rose direct from the walls above a slightly masked eaves course. The four oblique sides are connected to the tower by a feature called a broach, which may be described as part of a blunt pyramid. The broach-spire (Fig. 24) is to be met with in many parts of England, but especially in Northamptonshire. The chief ornaments of an E. E. spire consist in small windows (called spire-lights or lucarnes) each surmounted by its gablet. [Illustration: FIG. 24.--EARLY ENGLISH SPIRE. CHURCH OF ST. MARY MAGDALENE, WARBOYS, LINCOLNSHIRE.] In the Dec. period it was common to finish the tower by a parapet, and to start the spire behind the parapet, sometimes with a broach, often without. Pinnacles were frequently added at the corners of the tower, and an arch, like that of a flying buttress, was sometimes thrown across from the pinnacle to the spire. Spire-lights occur as before, and the surface of the spire is often enriched by bands of ornament at intervals. The general proportions of the spire were more slender than before, and the rib, which generally ran up each angle, was often enriched by crockets, _i.e._ tufts of leaves arranged in a formal shape (Fig. 25). [Illustration: FIG. 25.--DECORATED SPIRE. ALL SAINTS' CHURCH, OAKHAM, RUTLANDSHIRE.] Towers were frequently intended to stand without spires in the Perp. period, and are often finished by four effective angle-pinnacles and a cornice with battlements. Where spires occur in this period they resemble those of the Dec. period. Spires end usually in a boss or finial, surmounted by a weathercock. Ordinary roofs were usually finished by ornamental cresting, and their summits were marked by finials,[20] frequently of exquisite workmanship. _Ornaments._ We now come to ornaments, including mouldings, carving, and colour, and here we are landed upon a mass of details which it would be impossible to pursue far. Mouldings play a prominent part in Gothic architecture, and from the first to the last they varied so constantly that their profiles and grouping may be constantly made use of as a kind of architectural calendar, to point out the time, to within a few years, when the building in which they occur was erected.