CONSTRUCTION XIII. THE ROOF 183

bearings of it, very different from any observation possible to the general critic: and more than this, the inquiry would be useless to us in our Venetian studies, where the roofs are either not contemporary with the buildings, or flat, or else vaults of the simplest possible constructions, which have been admirably explained by Wills in his Architecture of the Middle Ages, Chap. VII., to which I may refer the reader for all that it would be well for him to know respecting the connection of the different parts of the vault with the shafts. He would also do well to read the passages on Tudor vaulting, pp. 185-193, in Mr. Garbett’s rudimentary Treatise on Design,¹ before alluded to.* I shall content myself therefore with noting one or two points on which neither writer has had occasion to touch, respecting the Roof Mask.

§ 3. It was said in § 5 of Chap. III., that we should not have occasion, in speaking of roof construction, to add materially to the forms then suggested. The forms which we have to add are only those resulting from the other curves of the arch developed in the last chapter; that is to say, the various eastern domes and cupolas arising out of the revolution of the horseshoe and ogee curves, together with the well-known Chinese concave roof. All these forms are of course purely decorative, the bulging outline, or concave surface being of no more use, or rather of less, in throwing off snow or rain, than the ordinary spire and gable; and it is rather curious, therefore, that all of them, on a small scale, should have obtained so extensive use in Germany and Switzerland, their native climate being that of the East, where their purpose seems rather to concentrate light upon their orbed surfaces. I much doubt their applicability, on a large scale, to architecture of any admirable dignity: their chief charm is, to the European eye, that of strangeness; and it seems

* Appendix 17 [p. 450].

¹ [The reference is to ch. vii. § 9 n., p. 106, above. The full title of the work in question is Rudimentary Treatise on the Principles of Design in Architecture as deducible from nature and exemplified in the works of the Greek and Gothic Architects, 1850.]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]