12. DECEMBER. _Killing swine._ It is hardly ever that this employment is

not given to one or other of the terminal months of the year. If not so engaged, December is usually putting new loaves into the oven; sometimes killing oxen. Spenser properly makes him feasting and drinking instead of January. § LIII. On the next page I have given a parallel view of the employment of the months from some Northern manuscripts, in order that they may be more conveniently compared with the sculptures of St. Mark's, in their expression of the varieties of climate and agricultural system. Observe that the letter (f.) in some of the columns, opposite the month of May, means that he has a falcon on his fist; being, in those cases, represented as riding out, in high exultation, on a caparisoned white horse. A series nearly similar to that of St. Mark's occurs on the door of the Cathedral of Lucca, and on that of the Baptistery of Pisa; in which, however, if I recollect rightly, February is fishing, and May has something resembling an umbrella in his hand, instead of a hawk. But, in all cases, the figures are treated with the peculiar spirit of the Gothic sculptors; and this archivolt is the first expression of that spirit which is to be found in Venice. SECOND PERIOD +---------+--------------+---------------+---------------+---------------+ | | | MS. French. | MS. French. | MS. French. | | | St. Mark's. | Late 13th | Late 13th | Late 13th | | | | Century | Century | Century | |---------+--------------+---------------+---------------+---------------+ | | | | | | |January |Carrying wood.|Janus feasting.|Janus feasting.|Drinking and | | | | | | stirring fire.| | | | | | | |February |Warming feet. |Warming feet. |Warming feet. |Pruning. | | | | | | | |March |Going to war. |Pruning. |Pruning. |Striking | | | | | | with axe. | | | | | | | |April |Carrying |Gathering |Gathering |Gathering | | | sheep. | flowers. | flowers. | flowers. | | | | | | | |May |Crowned with |Riding (f.). |Riding (f.). |Playing | | | flowers. | | | violin. | | | | | | | |June |Reaping. |Mowing. |Mowing. |Gathering large| | | | | | red flowers. | | | | | | | |July |Mowing. |Reaping. |Reaping. |Mowing. | | | | | | | |August |Asleep. |Threshing. |Gathering |Reaping. | | | | | grapes. | | | | | | | | |September|Carrying |Sowing. |Sowing. |Drinking wine. | | | grapes. | | | | | | | | | | |October |Digging. |Gathering |Beating oak. |Sowing. | | | | grapes. | | | | | | | | | |November |Catching |Beating oak. |Killing swine. |Killing swine. | | | birds. | | | | | | | | | | |December |Killing swine.|Killing swine. |Baking. |Killing oxen. | +---------+--------------+---------------+---------------+---------------+ +---------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ | | MS. French. | MS. English. | MS. Flemish. | | |Early 14th Century.|Early 15th Century.| 15th Century. | |---------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------| | | | | | |January |Warming feet. | Janus feasting. |Feasting | | | | | | | | | | | |February |Bearing candles. | Warming feet. |Warming hands. | | | | | | |March |Pruning. | Carrying candles. |Reaping. | | | | | | |April |Gathering flowers. | Pruning. |Gathering flowers.| | | | | | |May |Riding (f.). | Riding (f.). |Riding with lady | | | | | on pillion. | | | | | | |June |Carrying (fagots?) | Carrying fagots. |Sheep-shearing. | | | | | | | | | | | |July |Mowing. | Mowing. |Mowing. | | | | | | |August |Reaping. | Reaping. |Reaping. | | | | | | |September|Threshing. | Threshing. |Sowing. | | | | | | |October |Sowing. | Sowing. |Beating oak. | | | | | | |November |Killing swine. | Killing swine. |Pressing (grapes?)| | | | | | |December |Baking. | Baking. |Killing swine. | +---------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ § LIV. In the private palaces, the entrances soon admitted some concession to the Gothic form also. They pass through nearly the same conditions of change as the windows, with these three differences: first, that no arches of the fantastic fourth order occur in any doorways; secondly, that the pure pointed arch occurs earlier, and much oftener, in doorways than in window-heads; lastly, that the entrance itself, if small, is nearly always square-headed in the earliest examples, without any arch above, but afterwards the arch is thrown across above the lintel. The interval between the two, or tympanum, is filled with sculpture, or closed by iron bars, with sometimes a projecting gable, to form a porch, thrown over the whole, as in the perfect example, 7 _a_, Plate XIV., above. The other examples in the two lower lines, 6 and 7, of that Plate are each characteristic of an enormous number of doors, variously decorated, from the thirteenth to the close of the fifteenth century. The particulars of their mouldings are given in the final Appendix. § LV. It was useless, on the small scale of this Plate, to attempt any delineation of the richer sculptures with which the arches are filled; so that I have chosen for it the simplest examples I could find of the forms to be illustrated: but, in all the more important instances, the door-head is charged either with delicate ornaments and inlaid patterns in variously colored brick, or with sculptures, consisting always of the shield or crest of the family, protected by an angel. Of these more perfect doorways I have given three examples carefully, in my folio work; but I must repeat here one part of the account of their subjects given in its text, for the convenience of those to whom the larger work may not be accessible. § LVI. "In the earlier ages, all agree thus far, that the name of the family is told, and together with it there is always an intimation that they have placed their defence and their prosperity in God's hands; frequently accompanied with some general expression of benediction to the person passing over the threshold. This is the general theory of an old Venetian doorway;--the theory of modern doorways remains to be explained: it may be studied to advantage in our rows of new-built houses, or rather of new-built house, changeless for miles together, from which, to each inhabitant, we allot his proper quantity of windows, and a Doric portico. The Venetian carried out his theory very simply. In the centre of the archivolt we find almost invariably, in the older work, the hand between the sun and moon in the attitude of blessing, expressing the general power and presence of God, the source of light. On the tympanum is the shield of the family. Venetian heraldry requires no beasts for supporters, but usually prefers angels, neither the supporters nor crests forming any necessary part of Venetian bearings. Sometimes, however, human figures, or grotesques, are substituted; but, in that case, an angel is almost always introduced above the shield, bearing a globe in his left hand, and therefore clearly intended for the 'Angel of the Lord,' or, as it is expressed elsewhere, the 'Angel of His Presence.' Where elaborate sculpture of this kind is inadmissible, the shield is merely represented as suspended by a leather thong; and a cross is introduced above the archivolt. The Renaissance architects perceived the irrationality of all this, cut away both crosses and angels, and substituted heads of satyrs, which were the proper presiding deities of Venice in the Renaissance periods, and which in our own domestic institutions, we have ever since, with much piety and sagacity, retained." § LVII. The habit of employing some religious symbol, or writing some religious legend, over the door of the house, does not entirely disappear until far into the period of the Renaissance. The words "Peace be to this house" occur on one side of a Veronese gateway, with the appropriate and veracious inscription S.P.Q.R., on a Roman standard, on the other; and "Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord," is written on one of the doorways of a building added at the flank of the Casa Barbarigo, in the sixteenth or seventeenth century. It seems to be only modern Protestantism which is entirely ashamed of _all_ symbols and words that appear in anywise like a confession of faith. § LVIII. This peculiar feeling is well worthy of attentive analysis. It indeed, in most cases, hardly deserves the name of a feeling; for the meaningless doorway is merely an ignorant copy of heathen models: but yet, if it were at this moment proposed to any of us, by our architects, to remove the grinning head of a satyr, or other classical or Palladian ornament, from the keystone of the door, and to substitute for it a cross, and an inscription testifying our faith, I believe that most persons would shrink from the proposal with an obscure and yet overwhelming sense that things would be sometimes done, and thought, within the house which would make the inscription on its gate a base hypocrisy. And if so, let us look to it, whether that strong reluctance to utter a definite religious profession, which so many of us feel, and which, not very carefully examining into its dim nature, we conclude to be modesty, or fear of hypocrisy, or other such form of amiableness, be not, in very deed, neither less nor more than Infidelity; whether Peter's "I know not the man" be not the sum and substance of all these misgivings and hesitations; and whether the shamefacedness which we attribute to sincerity and reverence, be not such shamefacedness as may at last put us among those of whom the Son of Man shall be ashamed. § LIX. Such are the principal circumstances to be noted in the external form and details of the Gothic palaces; of their interior arrangements there is little left unaltered. The gateways which we have been examining almost universally lead, in the earlier palaces, into a long interior court, round which the mass of the palace is built; and in which its first story is reached by a superb external staircase, sustained on four or five pointed arches gradually increasing as they ascend, both in height and span,--this change in their size being, so far as I remember, peculiar to Venice, and visibly a consequence of the habitual admission of arches of different sizes in the Byzantine façades. These staircases are protected by exquisitely carved parapets, like those of the outer balconies, with lions or grotesque heads set on the angles, and with true projecting balconies on their landing-places. In the centre of the court there is always a marble well; and these wells furnish some of the most superb examples of Venetian sculpture. I am aware only of one remaining from the Byzantine period; it is octagonal, and treated like the richest of our Norman fonts: but the Gothic wells of every date, from the thirteenth century downwards, are innumerable, and full of beauty, though their form is little varied; they being, in almost every case, treated like colossal capitals of pillars, with foliage at the angles, and the shield of the family upon their sides. § LX. The interior apartments always consist of one noble hall on the first story, often on the second also, extending across the entire depth of the house, and lighted in front by the principal groups of its windows, while smaller apartments open from it on either side. The ceilings, where they remain untouched, are of bold horizontal beams, richly carved and gilded; but few of these are left from the true Gothic times, the Venetian interiors having, in almost every case, been remodelled by the Renaissance architects. This change, _however_, for once, we cannot regret, as the walls and ceilings, when so altered, were covered with the noblest works of Veronese, Titian, and Tintoret; nor the interior walls only, but, as before noticed, often the exteriors also. Of the color decorations of the Gothic exteriors I have, therefore, at present taken no notice, as it will be more convenient to embrace this subject in one general view of the systems of coloring of the Venetian palaces, when we arrive at the period of its richest developement.[98] The details, also, of most interest, respecting the forms and transitional decoration of their capitals, will be given in the final Appendix to the next volume, where we shall be able to include in our inquiry the whole extent of the Gothic period; and it remains for us, therefore, at present, only to review the history, fix the date, and note the most important particulars in the structure of the building which at once consummates and embodies the entire system of the Gothic architecture of Venice,--the DUCAL PALACE. FOOTNOTES [75] 38 ft. 2 in., without its cornice, which is 10 inches deep, and sustains pinnacles of stone 7 feet high. I was enabled to get the measures by a scaffolding erected in 1851 to repair the front. [76] I believe the necessary upper joint is vertical, through the uppermost lobe of the quatrefoil, as in the figure; but I have lost my memorandum of this joint. [77] "Dice, che non lauda per alcun modo di metter questo Serenissimo Dominio in tanto pericolo d' habitar un palazzo fabricato in aria."--_Pareri di XV. Architetti, con illustrazioni dell' Abbate Giuseppe Cadorin_ (Venice, 1838), p. 104. [78] "Il muro della sala è più grosso delle colonne sott' esso piedi uno e onze tre, et posto in modo che onze sei sta come in aere sopra la piazza, et onze nove dentro."--_Pareri di XV. Architetti_, p. 47. [79] Compare "Seven Lamps," chap. iii. § 7. [80] Pareri, above quoted, p. 21. [81] It is a curious proof how completely, even so early as the beginning of the sixteenth century, the Venetians had lost the habit of _reading_ the religious art of their ancient churches, that Sanuto, describing this injury, says, that "four of the _Kings_ in marble fell from their pinnacles above the front, at St. Mark's church;" and presently afterwards corrects his mistake, and apologises for it thus: "These were four saints, St. Constantine, St. Demetrius, St. George, and St. Theodore, all Greek saints. _They look like Kings_." Observe the perfect, because unintentional, praise given to the old sculptor. I quote the passage from the translation of these precious diaries of Sanuto, by my friend Mr. Rawdon Brown, a translation which I hope will some day become a standard book in English libraries. [82] I am not speaking here of iron balconies. See below, § XXII. [83] A Some details respecting the mechanical structure of the Venetian balcony are given in the final Appendix. [84] I found it convenient in my own memoranda to express them simply as fourths, seconds, &c. But "order" is an excellent word for any known group of forms, whether of windows, capitals, bases, mouldings, or any other architectural feature, provided always that it be not understood in any wise to imply preëminence or isolation in these groups. Thus I may rationally speak of the six orders of Venetian windows, provided I am ready to allow a French architect to speak of the six or seven, or eight, or seventy or eighty, orders of Norman windows, if so many are distinguishable; and so also we may rationally speak, for the sake of intelligibility, of the five orders of Greek pillars, provided only we understand that there may be five millions of orders as good or better, of pillars _not_ Greek. [85] Or in their own curves; as, on a small scale, in the balustrade fig. 6, Plate XIII., above. [86] For all details of this kind, the reader is referred to the final Appendix in Vol. III. [87] Two threads of white marble, each about an inch wide, inlaid in the dark grey pavement, indicate the road to the Rialto from the farthest extremity of the north quarter of Venice. The peasant or traveller, lost in the intricacy of the pathway in this portion of the city, cannot fail, after a few experimental traverses, to cross these white lines, which thenceforward he has nothing to do but to follow, though their capricious sinuosities will try his patience not a little. [88] An account of the conspiracy of Bajamonte may be found in almost any Venetian history; the reader may consult Mutinelli, Annali Urbani, lib. iii. [89] See account of series of capitals in final Appendix. [90] If the traveller desire to find them (and they are worth seeking), let him row from the Fondamenta S. Biagio down the Rio della Tana, and look, on his right, for a low house with windows in it like those in the woodcut No. XXXI. above, p. 256. Let him go in at the door of the portico in the middle of this house, and he will find himself in a small alley, with the windows in question on each side of him. [91] The bitterness of feeling with which the Venetians must have remembered this, was probably the cause of their magnificent heroism in the final siege of the city under Dandolo, and, partly, of the excesses which disgraced their victory. The conduct of the allied army of the Crusaders on this occasion cannot, however, be brought in evidence of general barbarism in the thirteenth century: first, because the masses of the crusading armies were in great part composed of the refuse of the nations of Europe; and secondly, because such a mode of argument might lead us to inconvenient conclusions respecting ourselves, so long as the horses of the Austrian cavalry are stabled in the cloister of the convent which contains the Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci. See Appendix 3, Vol. III.: "Austrian Government in Italy." [92] It is generally better to read ten lines of any poet in the original language, however painfully, than ten cantos of a translation. But an exception may be made in favor of Cary's Dante. If no poet ever was liable to lose more in translation, none was ever so carefully translated; and I hardly know whether most to admire the rigid fidelity, or the sweet and solemn harmony, of Cary's verse. There is hardly a fault in the fragment quoted above, except the word "lectured," for Dante's beautiful "favoleggiava;" and even in this case, joining the first words of the following line, the translation is strictly literal. It is true that the conciseness and the rivulet-like melody of Dante must continually be lost; but if I could only read English, and had to choose, for a library narrowed by poverty, between Cary's Dante and our own original Milton, I should choose Cary without an instant's pause. [93] See final Appendix, Vol. III., under head "Capitals." [94] This Plate is not from a drawing of mine. It has been engraved by Mr. Armytage, with great skill, from two daguerreotypes. [95] Vide final Appendix, under head "Archivolt." [96] "On Thursday, the 20th, the front walls of two of the new houses now building in Victoria Street, Westminster, fell to the ground.... The roof was on, _and a massive compo cornice_ was put up at top, as well as dressings to the upper windows. The roof is formed by girders and 4½-brick arches in cement, covered with asphalt to form a flat. The failure is attributed _to the quantity of rain which has fallen_. Others suppose that some of the girders were defective, and gave way, carrying the walls with them."--_Builder_, for January 29th, 1853. The rest of this volume might be filled with such notices, if we sought for them. [97] "Ysame," collected together. [98] Vol. III. Chap. I. I have had considerable difficulty in the arrangement of these volumes, so as to get the points bearing upon each other grouped in consecutive and intelligible order.