FRENCH GOTHIC, FIFTEENTH CENTURY.
Church-architecture.—The magnificent churches erected in France in the thirteenth century were concluded in either the fourteenth or the fifteenth, but few were absolutely finished. The inspiration of the thir teenth century had passed away, and the belief that no church could be laid out with sufficient size and magnificence—the dislike to erect a work which could be finished at once, lest in the near future it should be taken down to make way for a more splendid one—had given place to want of zeal which did not permit the finishing of what an earlier time had com menced with the intention that subsequent ages should acquire merit by its completion. Still weaker was the desire to undertake magnificent new buildings. The old churches were now large enough and good enough. Whatever was executed in tile ecclesiastical domain was inconsiderable, compared with the works of the preceding period. Characteristic forms had passed away, and conventional- ornamentation, not harmony of form, had taken its place. The works of the fifteenth century may almost be called rococo,. especially in the quality of naturalism they cannot vie with the German works, which are almost always distinguished from the French by their nobler proportions.
Secular Architecture.—Bnt, though French architecture during the fifteenth century could not develop great works in the domain of church building, it attained to brilliant results in that of secular structures. The fortifications of the cities had, as in Germany, to be strengthened after firearms bad made untenable the entire system of defence previously used (fil. 37, fig. 4). Citizens' houses in the increasing and multiplying cities—partly monumental, partly constructed in wood—palaces of the nobility, hotels de ville, and hospitals exercised the builders, and as in the preceding period scarcely a church corresponded to the original ideal, so was it now with the buildings serving for either public or private needs.
Chateau of Poitiers.—The rebuilding of the Castle of Poitiers, which belonged to the counts of Poitou, was commenced in 1395. The spacious ball, with its gable richly decorated both inside and out, its magnificent • fireplace at the gable-end, and its flanking angle-towers, is still preserved, as is also the roof, the construction of which dates from the beginning of the fifteenth century. Dating also from the same time, there stands by its side a structure capped with machicolations, but on its side adorned with rich architectural decorations, which offer serious obstacles to the use of the warlike portions; so that the latter are to be viewed rather as rem iniscences.
The Bastille at Paris, destroyed during the Revolution, was also a castle with round angle-towers, battlements, and machicolations. The Nesle 'rower at Paris (fig. 5), which was long ago swept away, served also for military purposes. The hospital at Beaune, in Burgundy, was built in 1343, and about the middle of the century the beautiful light house at La Rochelle and the belfry at Evrcux. The Hotel de Ville of St. Quentin belongs to the fifteenth century. A richly-magnificent design of the same century is the house of Jacques Ccenr, at Bourges. An extremely picturesque group of buildings surrounds a trapezium shaped court, and has come down to our day almost uninjured; the entrance is shown in Figure 2 (bl. 37). A portion of the Abbey of Cluny at Paris is still preserved, and contains a museum of mediaeval art-treasures (fig. 3.) The Palais de Justice at Rouen (fig. I) has a deco rative exterior. The Hotel de la Tremonille, at Paris, which was de stroyed in the present century, was a splendid structure built by Louis de la Tremouille about 149o; of its rich decoration some idea is given by the window shown in Figure 7.
Citizens' residences of wood, such as exist in Germany, also remain in France in considerable abundance. Quite a number constructed at the close of the fifteenth century were destroyed in Paris a few years since. Many still exist at Rouen, and among them the Abbot's House of St. Arnaud is distinguished by its extraordinary wealth of carvings. Houses of this kind exist also in Rheims and other cities. At St. Antonin, in Tarn-et-Garonne, two fireplaces of the fifteenth century are still preserved.
Two highly-original structures are the great pigeon-houses at Cre teuil and Nesle; but we should not leave unmentioned the palace of the grand duke of Lorraine at Nancy, Château Meillant, near St. Arnaud, built about 1500, or the contemporary Château Josselin, in Brittany, a window of which is shown in Figure 6. Louis XII. built the charming Chambre des Compes at the Palais Royal at Paris, the elegant-roofed open staircase of which was greatly admired. The Châteaux of Creil and Chantilly belong to the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Châteaux of Verger, in Anjou, and Bury, near Blois, as well as the Hotel Bourg therould, at Rouen, conduct us already into the Renaissance.