The Cathedrals And Churches Of The Rhine And North Germany

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1906 edition. Excerpt: ... Certain details, particularly the unmoulded soffits of the arches, and the foliaged capitals of the bulky columns, bespeak the hand of an architect who drew his inspiration from some of the noble churches of Western France j1 but taken in the mass, the nave of Paderborn Cathedral is essentially German, and like many buildings of its country far behind such contemporary works as mm&mmm. PADERBORN. (The Cathedral from the South.) the choir of Westminster, the naves of York and Lichfield, and the greater portions of Amiens, Rheims, Troyes, and other great French churches--a fact not surprising when it is remembered how tenacious the Teutonic mind was of those architectural forms that had been long since abandoned by ourselves and the French. 1 It is not unlikely that the cathedral at Poitiers formed the model for the nave of Paderborn. If we compare the capitals of the columns in the nave of Paderborn Cathedral with those and other ornamentation of the choir of Lincoln Cathedral, which was commenced more than half a century earlier,1 we shall be convinced that the art works of Germany, although passing in the first half of the thirteenth century through a novel phase, having an undoubted beauty and elegance of its own, were far from having reached the point in the development of Gothic ideas that France and England had at the same moment attained. Indeed, from the scanty remains of such documentary evidence as relates to the construction and dedication of churches that I have been able to meet with in German chronicles, there is reason to believe that throughout the whole of the first quarter of the thirteenth century, if not later, architectural art in Germany continued to be characterized by an ornamentation similar to that illustrated in...

THERE is no topographical division of Europe which more readily defines itself and its limits than the Rhine valley from Schaffhausen to where the river empties into the North Sea. The region has given birth to history and legend of a most fascinating character, and the manners and customs of the people who dwell along its banks are varied and picturesque. Under these circumstances it was but to be expected that architectural development should have expressed itself in a decided and unmistakable fashion. One usually makes the Rhine tour as an interlude while on the way to Switzerland or the Italian lakes, with little thought of its geographical and historical importance in connection with the development of modern Europe. It was the onward march of civilization, furthered by the Romans, through this greatest of natural highways to the north, that gave the first political and historical significance to the country of the Rhine watershed. And from that day to this the Rhenish provinces and the Low Countries bordering upon the sea have occupied a prominent place in history. There is a distinct and notable architecture, confined almost, one may say, to the borders of the Rhine, which the expert knows as Rhenish, if it can be defined at all; and which is distinct from that variety of pre-Gothic architecture known as Romanesque.

"Prepared by the R.R. Bowker Company's Department of Bibliography in collaboration with the Publications Systems Department"--Page opposite t.p. Includes indexes. Author Index ... 3901-4069 Title Index ... 4071-4389.