ARCHITECTURE - Karatunov.net

CH. xxv] FRENCH ROMANESQUE 169rapidly to all the infinite varieties of vault that followed. DevelopnThe old-fashioned barrel vault disappeared: a square the GotWcbay was no longer necessary for vaultsetting out a crossvault : if the semi-circular arch were retained, as it wasat first, for the diagonal rib, the rest being pointed couldbe raised to the same height ifnecessary, and they weregenerally raised to a height not much less, leaving thevault to be only slightly domical. With all these changesthe art passed rapidly into a new phase, and in the greatburst of cathedral building which marked the reignofPhilip Augustus we find Romanesqueorno place.tradition has littleIf we look round the other parts of France in the Summarymiddle of the I2th century, when this movement towardsa new style took place in the central domain, esquewe find Romanesque art still itsrunning course. InBurgundy, though the pointedarch had been admitted inthe narthex of V^zelay, the general design still clung toancient tradition, and the round arch still ruled thedesign. In Auvergne the round arch still reignedsupreme, but the admirable skill of the architects of thatprovince had refined and developed it into a style oftheir own so interesting and originalthat one regrets theGothic invasion, which indeed never achieved more thana partial triumph over the native art. In Aquitaine andAnjou the domed style still prevailed, and may be tracedto Loches in Touraine where as late as 1 1 80 the churchwas covered by what is practicallya series of hollowspires. In Normandy the sturdy round-arched stylefollowed a line of its own, owing but little to Romantradition, practical, dignified,and severe, into whichsculpture hardly enters at all. Lastlyin Provence nomovement at all had been made in the direction of