We have now reached that point in the history of mediæval architecture when it took an entirely new and original development. It has already been pointed out[6] that this new departure sprung from the necessity which arose for the invention of an elastic system of vaulting which should admit of all the arches, forming vaults over spaces of any form on plan, being carried to the same height at the ridge. This requirement led to the introduction of the pointed arch in the vaulting, and from that department it soon spread to all the other arched features of the architecture. This new development took place at a time when great changes were occurring, especially in France, in social and intellectual life. Men’s minds were then gradually awakening, science and instruction were spreading under Abailard and other teachers, the towns were obtaining their freedom, and a new system of things was gradually unfolding itself. Architecture, which had hitherto been confined to the monasteries, was now undertaken by laymen, who, discarding the old traditional methods, strove after a new and simpler mode of expressing their ideas in stone. The elaborate and stereotyped features and ornaments of the Romanesque style were rejected, and simpler forms, at first almost without ornament, were adopted, which emphasised the constructional elements of the architecture. Of this simple, but vigorous, early pointed style numerous examples still exist in France and Spain. When introduced amongst the Normans and English towards the close of the twelfth century the pointed style had acquired a certain amount of ornamentation of a new and appropriate description. The examples already illustrated show that during the Transition period the new style was making itself felt in Scotland about the end of the twelfth century. At Dundrennan and Jedburgh Abbeys the pointed arch becomes prominent amongst the round arches of the earlier style, but many of the old enrichments are still adhered to. This clinging to old forms may still to a certain extent be noticed in some of the structures whose leading features are in the first pointed style, but these relics gradually, though slowly, disappear. The round arch, however, sometimes maintains its position in Scottish doorways throughout the whole of the Gothic period.[7]