FRENCH ARCHITECTURE. 1 — VI. THE RENAISSANCE.
I
N the sixteenth-century unity became an accomplished fact. Though the people of Gaulish stock, modified by such intermixtures as had been effected during centuries, had not yet acquired the social preponderance; though the highest functions were not entrusted to them; though the masses filling their ranks did not enforce the will of the majority, as they did later, it is nevertheless true that they had permanently come out of that state of speechless oppression in which they had so long dwelt. They spoke; they acted; and already there was a foreshadowing of the fact that, constituting the majority, they were the power. They had their parliaments to defend their interests, discuss questions of taxes and furnish subsidies; even royalty was compelled to appeal to them through the Statesgeneral, and many a time was it forced to bow to the authority of public opinion.
All through the Middle Ages the municipalities and communes, wholly independent of one another and floating like scattered islets in the floods of barbarian invasion, had contended singly against feudalism, and one by one they had been subjugated. But when, by a long and toilsome process, royalty had gathered all these separate and even hostile elements into one group, a nation was created, a nation which was thereafter to be feared, both on account of its numbers and the extent of its territory, and which was all the more redoubtable because, up to the time when it became conscious of itself and refused to submit to any suzerainty other than its own, its power was wielded by one hand.
We can now take a final view of the field already covered; before entering upon an entirely new world, let us once more briefly note the long succession of historic events thus far bearing upon our subject.
In the Gallo-Roman period Roman centralization, by which all individual forces were absorbed to the exclusive profit of the State, had at first rapidly developed a brilliant civilization, but this in time perished from its own excesses; the common people, that is the Gauls, were then a mere herd, without will or power of initiative, and in blind subjection to numerous functionaries appointed by a distant government. The ties by which so many provinces and conquered nations were bound to Rome had been so distended that they broke at the first onset, and this vast empire, which, viewed from a distance, appeared to be a wisely ordered structure, presented a picture of general disaggregation and ruin. It required nearly ten centuries to evolve a new social state out of this disorder; the infusion of barbarian blood was needed to retemper generations debased temporarily by the decay of their civilization; and, on the other hand, this regeneration of the Gallo-Roman race was a necessary condition of the revival of patriotism, of that spirit of sacrifice and devotion to the abstract conception which we term the State; patriotism was a thing unknown to the Frankish tribes and it was, moreover, incompatible with their jealous passion for individual independence.
Royalty had renewed the attempt brilliantly inaugurated by Charlemagne, but abandoned by his successors, and had perseveringly, though slowly, carried it to a successful issue. On a less gigantic scale, but with the more lasting materials scattered over the country and in more solidly cemented courses, it gradually reared its constructions on the old Roman plan. In fact, except for modifications necessitated by altered circumstances, the reorganization of law and justice and of the public and military administration was largely made, like that of Charlemagne, on the ancient model.
This transformation was destined to effect a transformation in manners and customs: in the sixteenth-century, with the uplifting of the popular masses, sociability, the specially charac
teristic mark of our race, again became dominant, while the wild spirit of independence which led the Franks to live in a state of isolation disappeared never to return. As early as the fifteenth-century, life in common had begun to seem desirable and the influence of this made itself felt; the dwellings were made more spacious, more comfortable, more accessible and, above all, more open; the stronghold was gradually abandoned and, at last deserted, was doomed to fall into ruins; in the cities, on the other hand, great residences and palaces were erected, and pleasure houses sprang up all over the country. Dwellings, palaces and chateaux lost the stern aspect of solidly walled-in and scarcely lighted fortresses; the owner of an abode began to throw open his gates and welcome guests at his board. The Valois monarchs set the example with gay court receptions and fetes which were attended by vast concourses of people; and thereafter every one gave himself up to the pleasures of social life.
Could such a radical and even revolutionary transformation of manners have resulted merely from the natural changes of time? A people does alter from century to century; but so
long as its ethnological composition is virtually the same, the modifications are largely superficial and do not affect its fundamental characteristics, from the siege of Troy down to the age of Pericles, the Greek is always the same light, shrewd individual; from the establishment of the Republic to the Empire of Augustus, the Roman is ever hard and despotic. But the Frank dwelling in his fortified castle, sombre and solitary, surrounded by his wife, his children and his armed retainers, is by no means the brilliant and thoughtless Frenchman of the Valois court; still less is he the courtier and “lʽhonnête homme ” — that is to say, the courteous man, the maker of fine speeches, the gallant — of the court of Louis XIV. Time itself is powerless to change human nature thus completely. As we have said, such a transformation could only have been accomplished by the yielding of a race which had long maintained the social preponderance to another which had, in its turn, gained the supremacy.
The part played by architecture changed also, for it always reflects the manners of the day. There had long been but one common conception capable of a common expression, namely, religious faith. In the eleventh-century religious thought had united mankind in a single aspiration; in architecture, the church then became everything. The dwelling was merely a covered abode, the chateau was only a fortress; to the building of the church, on the other hand, man brought all the treasures of grace, imagination and beauty pent up in his soul. But from the fifteenth-century the place retained by the church in the history of architecture is only a secondary one; palaces, castles and sumptuous residences monopolized the products of all the arts. It was for himself that man now studied the subtile charms of architecture, painting and sculpture; he drew upon them for the most refined pleasures of existence.
We see displayed in this neither the sentiments of the Christian nor the instinct of the man of the north. They both keep steadily in view the misery and sufferings of humanity: the latter, hardy and vigorous, aims, by a persevering and relentless struggle, to remedy these evils; the Christian seeks consolation for the pains endured here in pious deeds and hopes of a bright hereafter. The periods of greatest religious fervor are therefore those of the greatest human misery: as for example, is seen in the frightful sufferings of the last days of the ancient world, or in the Middle Ages, under the despotic empire of violence.
We are indebted to antiquity, and especially to Greek antiquity, for that sentiment which makes life attractive to us in a tolerable social milieu; which leads us to seek our happiness in the free expansion of our faculties.
In this way modern thought joins hands with ancient thought across the gap of centuries. The above shows in brief the sources and formative processes of modern society in France. In the period upon which we are about to enter this society assumes a new character, wholly unlike that which we have hitherto observed.
The great facts of our history from the sixteenth century on are well known; the wars with Italy, the Reformation, the religious wars which offered a pretext for an uprising of the last leaders of the aristocracy; the definite consolidation of the royal power and the humiliation of the aristocracy under Henry IV and Richelieu; the supreme glory of the monarchy under Louis XIV, and then its rapid decadence; the advent of the bourgeoisie, and later that of the democracy. We will not
1 From the French of P. Planat, in Planat’s “Encylop&die de lʽArchitecture
et de la Construction. ˮ Continued from page 81, No. 802.
I
N the sixteenth-century unity became an accomplished fact. Though the people of Gaulish stock, modified by such intermixtures as had been effected during centuries, had not yet acquired the social preponderance; though the highest functions were not entrusted to them; though the masses filling their ranks did not enforce the will of the majority, as they did later, it is nevertheless true that they had permanently come out of that state of speechless oppression in which they had so long dwelt. They spoke; they acted; and already there was a foreshadowing of the fact that, constituting the majority, they were the power. They had their parliaments to defend their interests, discuss questions of taxes and furnish subsidies; even royalty was compelled to appeal to them through the Statesgeneral, and many a time was it forced to bow to the authority of public opinion.
All through the Middle Ages the municipalities and communes, wholly independent of one another and floating like scattered islets in the floods of barbarian invasion, had contended singly against feudalism, and one by one they had been subjugated. But when, by a long and toilsome process, royalty had gathered all these separate and even hostile elements into one group, a nation was created, a nation which was thereafter to be feared, both on account of its numbers and the extent of its territory, and which was all the more redoubtable because, up to the time when it became conscious of itself and refused to submit to any suzerainty other than its own, its power was wielded by one hand.
We can now take a final view of the field already covered; before entering upon an entirely new world, let us once more briefly note the long succession of historic events thus far bearing upon our subject.
In the Gallo-Roman period Roman centralization, by which all individual forces were absorbed to the exclusive profit of the State, had at first rapidly developed a brilliant civilization, but this in time perished from its own excesses; the common people, that is the Gauls, were then a mere herd, without will or power of initiative, and in blind subjection to numerous functionaries appointed by a distant government. The ties by which so many provinces and conquered nations were bound to Rome had been so distended that they broke at the first onset, and this vast empire, which, viewed from a distance, appeared to be a wisely ordered structure, presented a picture of general disaggregation and ruin. It required nearly ten centuries to evolve a new social state out of this disorder; the infusion of barbarian blood was needed to retemper generations debased temporarily by the decay of their civilization; and, on the other hand, this regeneration of the Gallo-Roman race was a necessary condition of the revival of patriotism, of that spirit of sacrifice and devotion to the abstract conception which we term the State; patriotism was a thing unknown to the Frankish tribes and it was, moreover, incompatible with their jealous passion for individual independence.
Royalty had renewed the attempt brilliantly inaugurated by Charlemagne, but abandoned by his successors, and had perseveringly, though slowly, carried it to a successful issue. On a less gigantic scale, but with the more lasting materials scattered over the country and in more solidly cemented courses, it gradually reared its constructions on the old Roman plan. In fact, except for modifications necessitated by altered circumstances, the reorganization of law and justice and of the public and military administration was largely made, like that of Charlemagne, on the ancient model.
This transformation was destined to effect a transformation in manners and customs: in the sixteenth-century, with the uplifting of the popular masses, sociability, the specially charac
teristic mark of our race, again became dominant, while the wild spirit of independence which led the Franks to live in a state of isolation disappeared never to return. As early as the fifteenth-century, life in common had begun to seem desirable and the influence of this made itself felt; the dwellings were made more spacious, more comfortable, more accessible and, above all, more open; the stronghold was gradually abandoned and, at last deserted, was doomed to fall into ruins; in the cities, on the other hand, great residences and palaces were erected, and pleasure houses sprang up all over the country. Dwellings, palaces and chateaux lost the stern aspect of solidly walled-in and scarcely lighted fortresses; the owner of an abode began to throw open his gates and welcome guests at his board. The Valois monarchs set the example with gay court receptions and fetes which were attended by vast concourses of people; and thereafter every one gave himself up to the pleasures of social life.
Could such a radical and even revolutionary transformation of manners have resulted merely from the natural changes of time? A people does alter from century to century; but so
long as its ethnological composition is virtually the same, the modifications are largely superficial and do not affect its fundamental characteristics, from the siege of Troy down to the age of Pericles, the Greek is always the same light, shrewd individual; from the establishment of the Republic to the Empire of Augustus, the Roman is ever hard and despotic. But the Frank dwelling in his fortified castle, sombre and solitary, surrounded by his wife, his children and his armed retainers, is by no means the brilliant and thoughtless Frenchman of the Valois court; still less is he the courtier and “lʽhonnête homme ” — that is to say, the courteous man, the maker of fine speeches, the gallant — of the court of Louis XIV. Time itself is powerless to change human nature thus completely. As we have said, such a transformation could only have been accomplished by the yielding of a race which had long maintained the social preponderance to another which had, in its turn, gained the supremacy.
The part played by architecture changed also, for it always reflects the manners of the day. There had long been but one common conception capable of a common expression, namely, religious faith. In the eleventh-century religious thought had united mankind in a single aspiration; in architecture, the church then became everything. The dwelling was merely a covered abode, the chateau was only a fortress; to the building of the church, on the other hand, man brought all the treasures of grace, imagination and beauty pent up in his soul. But from the fifteenth-century the place retained by the church in the history of architecture is only a secondary one; palaces, castles and sumptuous residences monopolized the products of all the arts. It was for himself that man now studied the subtile charms of architecture, painting and sculpture; he drew upon them for the most refined pleasures of existence.
We see displayed in this neither the sentiments of the Christian nor the instinct of the man of the north. They both keep steadily in view the misery and sufferings of humanity: the latter, hardy and vigorous, aims, by a persevering and relentless struggle, to remedy these evils; the Christian seeks consolation for the pains endured here in pious deeds and hopes of a bright hereafter. The periods of greatest religious fervor are therefore those of the greatest human misery: as for example, is seen in the frightful sufferings of the last days of the ancient world, or in the Middle Ages, under the despotic empire of violence.
We are indebted to antiquity, and especially to Greek antiquity, for that sentiment which makes life attractive to us in a tolerable social milieu; which leads us to seek our happiness in the free expansion of our faculties.
In this way modern thought joins hands with ancient thought across the gap of centuries. The above shows in brief the sources and formative processes of modern society in France. In the period upon which we are about to enter this society assumes a new character, wholly unlike that which we have hitherto observed.
The great facts of our history from the sixteenth century on are well known; the wars with Italy, the Reformation, the religious wars which offered a pretext for an uprising of the last leaders of the aristocracy; the definite consolidation of the royal power and the humiliation of the aristocracy under Henry IV and Richelieu; the supreme glory of the monarchy under Louis XIV, and then its rapid decadence; the advent of the bourgeoisie, and later that of the democracy. We will not
1 From the French of P. Planat, in Planat’s “Encylop&die de lʽArchitecture
et de la Construction. ˮ Continued from page 81, No. 802.