The Renaissance was first brought into Switzerland by painters who adorned the facades with their brilliant colors, and who thus often worked in contrast to the intentions of the Gothic architect. Among the earliest of these paintings must be reckoned those which Hans Holbein executed in 1516 in the Hertenstein House at Lucerne; of the same year are the wall paintings with many Renaissance Porotif at Stein, in Switzerland. A por tal in' Renaissance style leading to the sacristy from the aisle around the apse of the cathedral at Breslau bears the date 1517. At the Town-hall of Freiburg in Breisgau the date 1518 occurs on a Renaissance shield, so that the various Renaissance elements which mingle with the Gothic belong to that date.
A larger structure in the new style is the parish church at Ratisbon, erected between 1519 and 1538 by the Augsburg master Hans Hiber. Only the choir, with the two towers, was executed, while a magnificent polygonal structure which would have formed the church proper was never finished. Also the windows of the cloisters of the cathedral—perhaps a work of Wolfgang Roritzer—show in their framework the fantastic candelabra like columns of the Italian Renaissance with measureless exaggeration. The Renaissance reached Wiirzburg in the tomb of Bishop Lorenz von Bibra (1519), constructed by Tilman Riemensehneider. The episcopal residence at Freising, built in 152o, is exteriorly quite simple and un adorned, since the facade was intended to be covered throughout with wall-paintings. In the court is a gallery in which Gothic and Renais sance are mingled. The Jagellon chapel at the Cathedral of Cracow was, however, erected by the Florentine master Bartolommeo in the noblest forms of the Italian Renaissance; a round dome with a lantern above a square space bears the date 152o. The Tueher Monument, in the Cathe dral of Ratisbon, executed in 1521 in Peter Viseher's foundry at Nurem berg, shows decided and pure Renaissance forms. Gothic elements mingled with some of the Renaissance are exhibited in the Leinwand haus at Breslau; the Renaissance brings to mind Venetian models. The beautiful portal of the arsenal built by Ferdinand I. at Vienna-Neustadt (1524) is probably the work of an Italian.
Sificad of the new style now continually widened its boundaries and became more and more generally accepted. In almost all parts of Germany church dignitaries and chapters were henceforward in unison with the Italians.
The oldest Renaissance-work on the Rhine is probably the lectern of St. Maria in Capitnlo, which was executed at Mechlin in 1521, and set up
at Cologne. A decided promoter of the new style was Albrecht of Bran denburg, archbishop of Mayence, who in 1525 had caused the erection for himself of a sepulchral monument in the collegiate church at Aschaffen burg; Peter Vischer was employed to execute the work. The beautiful Judeubrunnen (" Jew's Fountain ") which he constructed at Mayence in memory of the battle of Pavia dates from 1526, and of the same date is the pulpit which he placed in the collegiate church at Halle, where in 1529 he began the old episcopal residence.
The monument of Frederick the Wise at Wittenberg (1527) indicates the extension of the style. The chapter-house at Breslau dates from 1527; the construction of the castle at Liegnitz was begun between 1527 and 1529, and its portal bears the date 1533. The town-hall at Breslau and the interesting house "Zur Krone " in the same city date from 1528.
The Landhans (council-hall of estates) at Gratz belongs to the first decade of the sixteenth century; it is decidedly Italian, the facade recall ing the older Italian period, while the court is allied to the Italian works of the sixteenth century. The Castle Porzia (formerly Ortenberg) at Spital, in Carinthia, is also an Italian structure.
The Castle of Dresden was commenced in 153o, and the " House of the Golden Tree" at Breslan—of the older decoration of which only a relief is now left—was built in 1 c32. The Castle Hertenfels at Torgau was, according to its inscriptions, built between 1532 and 1544.
The beautiful tomb which Stanislaus Saner caused to be erected for himself in the southern transept of the Church of the Holy Cross at Breslau dates from 1533, and that which the imperial counsellor Rybisch built in St. Elizabeth at Breslau belongs to the following year.
Tucher [Va.—From the same two years date the first great monu mental structures which were erected at Nuremberg in the Renaissance style. One of these is the Tucher Villa (1533), in which forms almost Gothic still prevail, while only a few, but pure and charming, Renais sance elements occur—as, among others, the beautiful oriel on the street side, which is executed entirely in Italian forms, although in general the oriel is a German feature not known in Italy. The Hirschvogelhaus, with its beautiful architecture (1534), must certainly have been executed under Italian influence.