Character of Renaissance ArchitectureMoore, Charles Herbert
History
Character of Renaissance Architecture
Moore, Charles Herbert
Architecture, Renaissance
The gatehouse of Stanway[154] has a portal with a four-centred
arch framed with a shallow Doric order, having a pilaster with a
free-standing column in front of it on either side. The entablature
has a double ressaut over each of these compound members, and a curved
pediment over the entablature is likewise broken into ressauts.
A rectangular tablet with an escutcheon, surmounted by a smaller
pediment, breaks through the middle of the larger pediment, and
acroteria are set on its sides, while a keystone in the arch carries a
shallow ressaut in the entablature. The front of Westwood Park[155] is
for the most part free from foreign elements, but it has a porch in the
form of a Roman triumphal arch with three openings, and a Corinthian
order of almost correct ancient proportions.
A remarkable illustration of the architectural taste of this time is
afforded by the well-known Gate of Honour at Caius College, Cambridge.
A triumphal arch scheme with an Ionic order, a Tudor arch, no openings
in the lateral bays, and no attic, is surmounted with a Greek temple
front of an engaged Corinthian order raised on tall pedestals connected
by an engaged balustrade. This embraces in width only the central bay
of the substructure, and solid abutments of concave outline are carried
up over the side bays. A plain attic over the pediment of the temple
forms the base for a square pyramid intersected by a tall hexagon,
surmounted with a hexagonal dome. No voids, except the central opening
under the Tudor arch, break the solid mass, but the wall surfaces are
ornamented with disks, niches, entablatures, and small pediments in
relief; and the pedestals of the temple order are carried on corbels
and ressauts in the lower entablature.
Of the many English houses built at the close of the sixteenth century,
few are more tasteless and pretentious than Wollaton Hall,[156] built
by Sir Francis Willoughby “at great expense, it was said, for a foolish
display of his wealth.” An order of coupled pilasters, broken in the
middle by salient blocks, adorn each story, while vacant niches in the
upper stories break the narrow wall surfaces between the pilasters on
either side of the large mullioned windows. The chimney-stacks are, as
in Longford Castle, shaped in the semblance of pseudo-Doric columns,
and the square angle pavilions have their cornices adorned with false
pediments of capricious outline and strap-work ornamentation, flanked
by obelisks on tall pedestals. One other feature of this remarkable
design is perhaps worthy of notice, namely, the portal of the north
front. This portal has a low arch, and is sheltered by a porch in
the form of a massive free-standing Doric order, the shafts of which
are broken in the middle by a salient drum, and the middle of the
entablature is supported by a heavy console which forms, at the same
time, a monstrous keystone to the arch (Fig. 132).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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