Cathédrale de Chartres; Civilization, Medieval; Mont-Saint-Michel (Abbey : France)
out the Greek style. There were originally twenty-four of these
statues, and nineteen remain. Beginning at the north end, and
passing over the first figure, which carries a head that does not
belong to it, notice the second, a king with a long sceptre of
empire, a book of law, and robes of Byzantine official splendour.
Beneath his feet is a curious woman's head with heavy braids of
hair, and a crown. The third figure is a queen, charming as a woman,
but particularly well-dressed, and with details of ornament and
person elaborately wrought; worth drawing, if one could only draw;
worth photographing with utmost care to include the strange support
on which she stands: a monkey, two dragons, a dog, a basilisk with a
dog's head. Two prophets follow--not so interesting;--prophets
rarely interest. Then comes the central bay: two queens who claim
particular attention, then a prophet, then a saint next the doorway;
then on the southern jamb-shafts, another saint, a king, a queen,
and another king. Last comes the southern bay, the Virgin's own, and
there stands first a figure said to be a youthful king; then a
strongly sculptured saint; next the door a figure called also a
king, but so charmingly delicate in expression that the robes alone
betray his sex; and who this exquisite young aureoled king may have
been who stands so close to the Virgin, at her right hand, no one
can now reveal. Opposite him is a saint who may be, or should be,
the Prince of the Apostles; then a bearded king with a broken
sceptre, standing on two dragons; and, at last, a badly mutilated
queen.
These statues are the Eginetan marbles of French art; from them all
modern French sculpture dates, or ought to date. They are singularly
interesting; as naif as the smile on the faces of the Greek
warriors, but no more grotesque than they. You will see Gothic
grotesques in plenty, and you cannot mistake the two intentions; the
twelfth century would sooner have tempted the tortures of every
feudal dungeon in Europe than have put before the Virgin's eyes any
figure that could be conceived as displeasing to her. These figures
are full of feeling, and saturated with worship; but what is most to
our purpose is the feminine side which they proclaim and insist
upon. Not only the number of the female figures, and their beauty,
but also the singularly youthful beauty of several of the males; the
superb robes they wear; the expression of their faces and their
figures; the details of hair, stuffs, ornaments, jewels; the
refinement and feminine taste of the whole, are enough to startle
our interest if we recognize what meaning they had to the twelfth
century.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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