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At Works, 9.49 Ruskin comments on the influence of the ‘Arab school’: ‘He retains the dome and adds the minaret. All is done with exquisite refinement’. Compare Notebook M2 p.113 and Notebook M2 p.131 and Lindsay II.10 on the ‘occasional and rare’ feature, ‘seen to particular advantage in the cathedral of Cremona, of numerous slender towers, rising, like minarets, in every direction, in front and behind. See also Works, 12.41 and the reference at Notebook M2 p.3back to Netherland minaret Brussels, where the reference is perhaps to the tower of the Hôtel de Ville in Brussels, completed in flamboyant style in 1455.
Perhaps Ruskin had in mind in Padua images such as:
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For images of the ‘minarets’ of Cremona see here.
Ruskin had not seen a minaret, but exotic images of the Ottoman Empire were a part of European fantasy in the middle of the nineteenth century. Examples of images of minarets are Sir William Allan, The Slave Market Constantinople 1838, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh (Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Visions of the Ottoman Empire, Exhibition Catalogue 1994) or David Roberts The Gate of Metawalea 1843, Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
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[Version 0.05: May 2008]