These two buildings may be considered as marking the progress the Romans were able to make in the invention of a new style of architecture, and the state in which they left it to their successors. It is worth remarking how, in transplanting Roman architecture to the new capital, the semi-Oriental nation seized on their own circular form, and, modifying and moulding it to their purpose, wrought out the Byzantine style. There the dome is the great feature, almost wholly to the exclusion of the rectangular form with its intersecting vaults. On the other hand, the rectangular form was appropriated by the Teutonic nations of the West with as distinct a rejection of the circular and domical forms, except in so far as an Eastern people still were mixed up with them. Thus in Italy both continued long to be used, the one as a baptistery, the other as a church, but always distinct as in Rome. In France they were so completely fused into one that it requires considerable knowledge of architectural analysis to separate them again into their component parts. In England we rejected the circular form altogether, and so they did in Germany, except when under French influence. Each race reclaimed its own among the spoils of Rome, and used it with the improvements it had acquired during its employment in the imperial city.

ORDERS.

The first thing that strikes the student in attempting to classify the objects of Roman architecture is the immense variety of their application, as compared with other styles. In Egypt there are only palaces and tombs. In Greece architecture was almost wholly confined to temples and theatres; in Etruria to tombs. In Rome we have temples, basilicas, theatres and amphitheatres, baths, palaces, tombs, arches of triumph and pillars of victory, gates, bridges, and aqueducts, all equally objects of architectural skill. The best of these, in fact, are those which other countries neglected. They would have been noble works indeed had it not been that the Romans sought to apply to them the orders and details which were meant only for the temples in other nations. In the time of Constantine these orders were nearly dying out, or were at least reduced to mere subordinate ornaments. The next step would have been their entire abolition, when the Roman would have been a new and complete style; but, as before remarked, this last step was denied them, and the orders therefore are still an essential part of Roman art. These are most important in the age of Augustus, and gradually die out as we approach that of Constantine.

THE DORIC.

Adopting the usual classification, the first of the Roman orders is the Doric, which, like everything else in this style, takes a place about half-way between the Tuscan wooden posts and the nobly simple order of the Greeks. It no doubt was a great improvement on the former, but for monumental purposes infinitely inferior to the latter. It was, however, more manageable; and for forums or court-yards, or

as a three-quarter column between arcades, it was better adapted to their purposes than the severer Greek, which, when so employed, not

only loses almost all its beauty, but becomes more unmeaning than the Roman. This was apparently felt; for there is not, so far as I know, a single Doric temple throughout the Roman world; and it would in consequence be most unfair to institute a comparison between a mere utilitarian prop and an order which the most refined artists in the world spent all their ingenuity in rendering the most perfect of architectural objects.

The addition of an independent base made the order much more generally useful, and its adoption brought it much more into harmony with the other two orders, which seems to have been the principal object of its introduction. The key-note of Roman architecture was the Corinthian order; and as, from the necessities of their tall many-storied buildings, they were forced to use the three orders together, often one over the other, it was indispensable that the three should be reduced to something like harmony. This was accordingly done, but at the expense of the Roman Doric order, which,

240.

Doric Order.

except when thus used in combination, must be confessed to have very little claim to our admiration.

IONIC.

The Romans were much more unfortunate in their modifications of the Ionic order than in those which they introduced into the Doric. They never seem to have either liked or understood it, nor to have employed it except as a mezzo termine between the other two. In its own native East this order had originally only been used in porticos between piers or antæ, where of course only one face was shown, and there were no angles to be turned. When the Greeks adopted it they used it in temples of Doric form, and in consequence were obliged to introduce a capital at each angle, with two voluted faces in juxtaposition at right angles to one another. When the Romans took it up, impatient of control, they turned all the volutes angularly, making them mere horns, and destroying all the

241.

Ionic Order.

meaning and all the grace of the order. This was not effected at once, but was the result of a great many attempts to get over the difficulties inherent in the employment of this order.

When used as a three-quarter column these alterations were not required, and then

but even in this

state it was never

equal to the Greek

examples, and gradually deteriorated to the corrupt form as seen in the Temple of Concord in the Forum, which is the most degenerate example of the order now to be found in Roman remains.

CORINTHIAN.

The fate of this order in the hands of the Romans was different from that of the other two. The Doric and Ionic orders had reached their acmé of perfection in the hands of the Grecian artists, and seem to have been incapable of further improvement. The Corinthian, on the contrary, was a recent invention; and although nothing can surpass the elegance and grace with. which the Greeks adorned it, this new capital never acquired with them that fulness and strength requisite to render it an appropriate architectural ornament. These were added to it by the Romans, or rather perhaps by Grecian artists acting under their direction, who thus, as

shown in the woodcut No. 242. Corinthian Order. From the Temple of Jupiter Stator. 242, produced a column which

for richness combined with proportion and architectural fitness has hardly been surpassed. The base is elegant and appropriate; the shaft is of the most pleasing proportion, and the fluting gives it just the requisite degree of richness and no more; and the capital, though bordering on

over-ornamentation, is so well arranged as to appear just suited to the work it has to do. The acanthus-leaves, it is true, go to the very verge of that degree of direct imitation of nature which is allowable in architectural ornaments; but they are disposed so formally, and there still remains so much that is conventional in them, that, though an extreme example, they are not perhaps justly open to criticism on this account. The entablature is not so admirable as the column. The architrave is too richly carved. It is evident, however, that this arose from the artist having copied in carving what the Greeks had only painted, and thus produced a complexity far from pleasing.

The frieze, as we now find it, is perfectly plain; but this undoubtedly was not the case when originally erected. It either must have been painted (in which case the whole order of course was also painted), or ornamented with scrolls or figures in bronze, which may probably have been gilt.

The cornice is perhaps open to the same criticism as the architrave, of being over rich, though this evidently arose from the same cause, of repeating in carving what ought only to be painted; and to our northern eyes at least it looks more appropriate for internal than for external architecture, but, under the purer skies where it was invented and used, this remark is perhaps hardly applicable.

The order of the portico of the Pantheon is, according to our notions, a nobler specimen of what an external pillar should be than that of the Temple of Jupiter Stator. The shafts are of one block, unfluted; the capital plainer; and the whole entablature, though as correctly proportional, is far less ornamented, so as to suit the greater simplicity of the whole.

The order of the Temple of Antoninus and Faustina is another example intermediate between these two. The columns are in this instance very similar to those of the Pantheon, and the architrave is plain. The frieze, however, is ornamented with more taste than any other in Rome, and is a very pleasing example of those conventional representations of plants and animals which are so well suited to architectural purposes-more like nature than those of the Greeks, but still avoiding direct imitation sufficiently to prevent the affectation of the ornament pretending to appear what it is not and cannot be.

The Maison Quarrée at Nismes presents an example of a frieze ornamented with exquisite taste, while at Baalbec, and in some other examples, we have friezes so over-ornamented that the effect is far more offensive, from utter want of repose, than even the baldness of the frieze of the Temple of Jupiter Stator in its present state is, from the opposite extreme.

Besides these there are at least 50 varieties of Corinthian capitals to be found either in Rome or in various parts of the Roman Empire, all executed within the three centuries during which Rome continued to be the Imperial city. Some of these are remarkable for an elegant simplicity, evidently betraying the hand of a Grecian artist, but some of them show a lavish exuberance of ornament, too characteristic of Roman art in general. Many of them contain, however, the germs of

something better than was accomplished in that age; and a collection of them would afford more useful suggestions for designing capitals than have yet been available to modern artists.

COMPOSITE ORDER.

Among their various attempts to improve the order which has just been described, the Romans hit upon one which is extremely characteristic of their whole style of art. This is known by the distinguishing name of the Composite order, though virtually it is more like the typical examples of the Corinthian order than many of those classed under the latter denomination.

The greatest defect of the Corinthian capital is the weakness of the small volutes supporting the angles of the abacus. A true artist would have remedied this by adding to their strength, and carrying up the fulness of the capital to the top. The

Romans removed the whole of the upper part, and substituted an Ionic capital instead. Their only original idea, if it may be so called, in art, was that of the putting two dissimilar things together to make one which should combine

the beauties of both, though in fact the one only serves to destroy the other. In the Composite capital they never could hide the junction; and consequently, though rich and in some respects an improvement on the order out of which it grew, this capital never came into general use, and has seldom found favour except amongst the blindest admirers of all that the Romans did.

In the latter days of the Empire the Romans

attempted another inno

vation which promised

244.

far better success, and with very little more elaboration would have been a great gain to the principles of architectural design. This was

X