DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.7595#0018
6
ESSAY ON
chap. i. way. They made their arches pointed, and crowded
V~"~Y^' all Italy with these cursed fabrics. May Heaven pre-
serve every good country from following such detest-
able fancies, whose ugliness forms so great a contrast
with the beauty of our works, that they do not deserve
to be any more spoken of."
Their host;- Such a declaration, coming in a manner so direct
lity traced to - .. _ . . lfTVT-i ia i r
a local dr- and positive irom the school or Michael Angelo, from
cumstance.
the fountain head of modern taste, seems calculated
to give rise to much perplexity, when contrasted with
the admiration expressed by men of the highest
authority, for works of Gothic Architecture. But a
fact hitherto, I believe, overlooked, relieves us in a
great measure from that perplexity; it is, that the
Gothic of Italy is very inferior to that of the rest of
Europe, so that the severe terms employed in the
passage just quoted, which, if applied to the speci-
mens of that style in England, France, Germany,
Spain, or Portugal, would be most unjust, and even
ludicrous, are well merited by the Gothic of Italy,
of which alone Yasari could speak, since his life,
written by himself, shews, that he had never crossed
the Alps. My recollection of what I had seen in
that country led me to this view, in which I have
ESSAY ON
chap. i. way. They made their arches pointed, and crowded
V~"~Y^' all Italy with these cursed fabrics. May Heaven pre-
serve every good country from following such detest-
able fancies, whose ugliness forms so great a contrast
with the beauty of our works, that they do not deserve
to be any more spoken of."
Their host;- Such a declaration, coming in a manner so direct
lity traced to - .. _ . . lfTVT-i ia i r
a local dr- and positive irom the school or Michael Angelo, from
cumstance.
the fountain head of modern taste, seems calculated
to give rise to much perplexity, when contrasted with
the admiration expressed by men of the highest
authority, for works of Gothic Architecture. But a
fact hitherto, I believe, overlooked, relieves us in a
great measure from that perplexity; it is, that the
Gothic of Italy is very inferior to that of the rest of
Europe, so that the severe terms employed in the
passage just quoted, which, if applied to the speci-
mens of that style in England, France, Germany,
Spain, or Portugal, would be most unjust, and even
ludicrous, are well merited by the Gothic of Italy,
of which alone Yasari could speak, since his life,
written by himself, shews, that he had never crossed
the Alps. My recollection of what I had seen in
that country led me to this view, in which I have