Architecture And Archæology.

1067 , and a considerable part of the existing ruins belong to this period : the capitals are plain and early : they have been covered over with plaster and painted . These are all the dated examples of the first half of the 11 th century that I have been able to identify . I have a list pf many others either founded or rebuilt during that period , but have not been able to ascertain what portions remain .

The churches of the Pyrenees were admirably described by Mr . Freeman , a fortnight since : they are of early character , and have belfry windows , with-mid wall shafts and balusters resembling those in England and some of them are probably of the 11 th century ; others more probably of the 12 th ; their history has not been investigated ; but in remote and mountainous districts the earlier style is generall

y continued to a later period than in more central places . In Switzerland there are two or three churches which partake of this character . The tower of St . Maurice is built of Roman materials at the beginning of the 11 th century , and the belfry windows bear a resemblance to the Saxon baluster windows , but they are formed by using Roman columns taken from some older building , and these

columns being too long for the windows , the lower part of them is built into the rubble wall , as more easy than cutting the marble columns . The church of Roman Motier has long and short work in the angles ; but this may arise only from the nature of the building material . In Germany occasional instances of resemblance are found

, but it seems to arise more from their belonging to the same rude period than that one is copied from the other . The idea that the ancient Lombards were great builders in stone , and the . predecessors in the art of the Normans , I believe will be found , on examination , to be altogether groundless . I have searched in vain in Lombardy for any work of any importance between the Roman period and the 11 th century

. The absence of any examples of this period at Rome has been already mentioned . The buildings of Pisa and Lucca , ignorantly attributed to the ancient Lombards , very commonly bear inscriptions recording their erection , and of others the history is perfectly well known .

They are the glory of the Pisan republic of thc 12 th and 13 th centuries , with sometimes portions of the older buildings of the 11 th century , or earlier , built up in them . At Ravenna , at Rome , ancl in the cities of central Italy , the buildings are almost entirely constructed of brick , cased with marble , and they present nothing whatever from which the Anglo-Saxons could have derived the peculiar features of

their buildings . I believe that the style called Lom bardic has as much to do with the ancient Lombards as the Gothic had to do with the ancient Gotlis , and no more . Both are convenient terms as indicating the races by whom they were used ; but we must be careful not to be misled by these names into erroneous notions about the dates of the buildings , which is

very frequently the case , even with popular writers who ought to know better . The buildings of Italy so constantly bear dates inscribed upon them , that a little examination is all that is required to ascertain this point . To return to England and our supposed Anglo-Saxon churches , it is remarkable that , out of nearly a hundred examples , spread over twenty-nine different counties , there

are so few of which we have any account , or even any mention in history : they arc nearly all obscure village churches . The large number of sixty-three Benedictine monasteries were founded in England before the year 1000 , but of this large number not more than three or four are found to have any existing remains of early character , and there are not altogether more than six out of the hundred early churches

that remain to us , of which we havo any mention before thc year 1000 . These are the two crypts of St . Wilfred , at Hexham and Ripon , thc walls of the church in the castle at Dover , and of tlie church at Brixwortb , both built of the fragments of some Roman building , and in the rudest manner , and some portions of similar walls at Lyminge , Kent , and at St . Martin ' s , Canterbury . These exhaust thc list of buildings which we can at all authenticate for the long period of five centuries . When we come to the 11 th century , the case

is widely different ] : the great building era now begins , and we have a number of buildings remaining which we can identify and authenticate ; and several of these are before the Norman conquest , as we have seen . The Normans did nob bring over an azmy of masons with them ; and , although many of their soldiers were masons also , there is no doubt that their buildings were erected

mainly by Saxon hands ; and , as the Norman rule was not very readily or quietly submitted to , they were obliged in the first instance to turn their attention to building castles to keep the people in subjection . Forty-nine castles ' . are enumerated in the Domesday survey , which was made about twenty years after the Conquest ; and of these one only , that of Arundel , is mentioned as having existed in the time

of Edward the Confessor . It is said that AVilliam attributed the facility of his concpiest chiefly to the circumstance of the Saxons having no strong places to keep the Norman army in check , and that he set about providing them as soon as possible . These early Norman castles are all built in the same type —a square massive keep or donjon , with the ground-floor

vaulted for store-rooms , or stables , or prisons , according to circumstances ; the entrance on the first-floor , with sometimes an external flight of stone steps ; in other cases a drawbridge to an outwork . These keeps do not appear to have been originally enclosed with stonewalls ; the custom ofraisingfortifications of a trench and vallum surmounted by wooden palisades was not yet abandoned ; in fact , it was used occasionally long afterwards , and these keeps seem to have been usually surrounded by a

double entrenchment , tho inner one enclosing the inner ballium or bailey , or principal court , in which the keep was situated , the outer ono enclosing the outer bailey or yardand this was frequently of considerable extent , in order to drive the cattle into it in case of need for protection . The custom of enclosing two courts or baileys round a castle was continued throughout the Middle Ages ; and in

later times farm buildings were erected in the outer bailey ; and by degrees in more peaceful times this was changed into the farmyard for tho Manor-house . The Norman keeps were so massive and so well built that a large number of them have been preserved in the present day , often upon no other ground than that it would cost more to pull them down , from the great strength of the

mortar , than the materials arc worth . We have , however , very few castles remaining that appear to have been completed in the time of William the the Conqueror . During the twenty-one years of his reign his hands were generally full . They seem to have been completed for the most part in the time of his successor . AVilliam the Conqueror , either from real piety , or in order

to make his peace with the Pope and with the Church , founded several magnificent abbeys , ivhich he richly endowed ; but to say that he built them is generally a mistake ; the monks erected the building with the help of tho funds which he gave them . The two most celebrated of these abbeys are at Caen , in Normandy . St . Stephen ' s , or the Abbaye aux Homines , was founded by William in 10 ( 16 , and dedicated in 1077 , which shows that in eleven years so much of the church was completed as was necessary for the performance of divine service . It was the usual custom of

the Middle Ages to consecrate a church as soon as the choir was completed , leaving the nave and other parts to be completed afterwards ; but the foundations for tho whole were generally laid at once , and the west front with one of the towers to hold the bells ; and the transepts were commonly begun at the same time as tho choir , or very soon after it : and as the monks or priests must have some place to live

in to enable them to perforin the service , thc domestic buildings of the abbey were generally begun at the same time as the choir , but they were frequently obliged to be content with temporary wooden buildings for a considerable time . A careful examination of this building shows not only that the choir has been rebuilt in the loth centuryand thc

, spires added at the sanio time , but that there is work of three periods antecedent to this , all belonging to what wc call thc Norman style , aud that the whole of thc west front , ivhich is so familiar to us from engravings , belongs to the second