CHAPTER VI
PROFILES OF THE TWELFTH AND THIRTEENTH CENTURIES IN ENGLAND AND OTHER COUNTRIES
The pointed architecture of England of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries differs from the Gothic of France, in the profiles of its subordinate members, such as capitals, bases, cornices, etc., no less than in its larger structural characteristics. This difference is manifest from the first, and is constant except where, as at Canterbury, the profiles are of French workmanship or design.
In considering these profiles we may begin with those of capitals. Among the earliest as well as the best capitals of the type of which I have already spoken as peculiar to England (in which the round abacus[1] takes the place of the square) are those of the east transepts of the Cathedral of Lincoln, and among the finest of these are the capitals of the triforium of the north arm, of which Fig. 140 is an illustration. This capital, though it lacks those qualities which distinguish the finest French examples, is of a character which certainly exhibits much to admire. In its main mass it is well formed as a member connecting the slender shaft with its heavy load. The Corinthianesque profile of its bell is at once functional and graceful. The round abacus, a form which agrees better than the square with the arch sections employed, presents no overhanging
- ↑ This form of abacus occurs in some purely Norman buildings, as in Southwell, Gloucester, and Malmesbury; but in Norman buildings generally the square abacus was employed. The general prevalence of the round form in early pointed buildings is, perhaps, one of the results of the Anglo-Saxon influence, which seems to have been stronger in the modification of details than in that of structural forms.
