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CH. xix] FRANCE AQUITAINE 57and a lantern tower over the crossing.isThe west frontrichly arcaded, and covered with sculptures which arefull of interest, and thoughit cannot be said that thedetails show any trace of Byzantine influence there isabout the whole design a distinctive character, with atouch of orientalism that seems to mark it off from theRomanesque of the central and eastern provinces.Herehowever grotesque ornament plays a considerable part,and the north rather than fromderived from Normandythe south, as has been already noticed at Souillac andLoches.S. Front again makes itself felt in the fagade of thecathedral of ANGOULEME (Plate CIII), which is arcadedsomething like Notre Dame at Poitiers but on a granderscale, and has on its two flanking towers what are halfspires and half cupolas, covered with scaling and surroundedby pinnacles which are miniature copies of thesteeple at P6rigueux. The central iscupola alsodecorated with scaling like those at P^rigueux, and so isthe cupola of the Abbaye des Dames at Saintes 1 .On asmaller scale ovoid pinnacles of this kind, covered withsimilar ornament, occur in the fagade at Civray and thereissomething of the same kind in the quaint and imperfectfront at S. Junien (Fig. 84).Central towers in the form of lanterns over domes either Westernon pendentives or squinches prevail in most of the churchesthat have been mentioned in this districtBut there areseveral instances of a western tower. S. RADEGONDE at Poitiers,Poitiers has had the nave re-built in the i$th or I4th century,but retains a fine Romanesquetower at the westend, square below, octagonal above, and on the angleswhere the two parts meet triangular pinnacles like the1Illustrated by V.-le-Duc, Diet. Rais. vol. HI. p. 305.wers