pronaos before the « ship » with the three apses of the choir and of the altar was necessarily conserved, but, as the artists were Saxons from Transylvania, they brought the manner of ornamentation used in the cities of their small and mountainous fatherland with them: so did the Gothic enter into the new and indigenous form of Roumanian art. This is not all: the eye of the Moldavian was accustomed to the rich colours of the clear azure skies, with the diverse aspects of the flower-studded meadows and the vast yellow undulating cornfields. All this was introduced into the ornamentation of the church in the making. Thus, besides the interior pictures, which were at first the work of Greek artist-immigrants, other means were employed to ensure a triumphant polychromy; the buildings were erected on a green stone foundation: red and blue enamelled bricks formed the longitudinal ribs of its frame, the blind, or Lombardic arcades, which are also to be found in many Byzantine examples, were emphasised, at the point at which the arches met, by plaques of faïence of all colours of the rainbow, while rows of them were used under the roof which, as in the lowly huts of the peasants, were built of a mosaic of shingles. A special artifice gave the smaller tower a double foundation, while the great belfry, in the centre of the lofty walls, dominated the whole, presenting an ensemble of perfect harmony and good proportions.
This was the form embraced by the very soul of the nation, and, to make it more gay still, an open peristyle was added: at first in Moldavia. With a stone surround separating these two ranks or aisles of blind arcades, and a gorgeous embroidery of clear and bright external mural decoration, also first employed in Moldavia and later in the neighbouring principality, the definitive form of Roumanian ecclesiastical art was reached, to be conserved until the
