Before the visitor is conducted through the architectural Courts on this side of the Nave, which have all been erected by Mr. Digby Wyatt, it is necessary he should understand that they differ considerably in arrangement and treatment from those on the opposite side, which have already been described. In the Egyptian, Greek, and other Courts through which he has passed, the forms or characteristics of some one distinctive structure have, to a greater or less extent, been given; but the Courts into which we are now about to penetrate are not architectural restorations, but rather so many collections of ornamental details stamped with unmistakeable individuality, and enabling us at a glance to recognise and distinguish the several styles that have existed and succeeded each other, from the beginning of the 6th down to the 16th century. In each Court will be found important details, ornament, and even entire portions, taken from the most remarkable or beautiful edifices of the periods they illustrate. Thus the palaces and Christian temples of Italy, the castles and churches of Germany, the hôtels-de-ville and châteaux of Belgium and France, and the cathedrals and mansions in our own country, have all been laid under contribution, so that here, for the first time in the history of architecture, we have the opportunity of acquiring a perceptive and practical knowledge of the beautiful art during the period of its later progress. [12] See “Handbook to the Byzantine Court,” by M. Digby Wyatt and J. B. Waring. [Illustration: Byzantine Court (entrance from North Transept).] The regular architectural sequence on the other side of the Nave finds its termination in the Roman Court, and we now resume the order of history with the “Byzantine” Court. Art, as we have already indicated, declined during the Roman Empire; but the general adoption of Christianity gave the blow that finally overthrew it; for the introduction of this faith was, unfortunately, accompanied with bitter and violent enmity against all Pagan forms of beauty. An edict of Theodosius, in the early part of the 5th century, ordered that pagan art should be utterly annihilated, and the primitive Christians demolished with frantic zeal the temples, bronzes, paintings, and statues that adorned the Romish capital. To complete the work of destruction, it is related that Gregory (A.D. 590), one of the celebrated “Fathers” of the Roman Church, gave orders that every vestige of Pagan Rome should be consigned to the Tiber; and thus was ancient Art smitten and overthrown, and the attempt made to efface its very foot-prints from the earth; so that, indeed, men had now to proceed as best they might, by painful and laborious efforts, towards the formation of a new and essentially Christian style of architecture, which, however feeble and badly imitated from ancient models at its commencement, was finally productive of the most original and beautiful results.