Window in the towers of Abbeville
John Ruskin
R. P. Cuff, engraver
1855
2 1/2 x 1 5/16 inches
Plate XII, Fig. 3, The Seven Lamps of Architecture in Works, 8.199
As the "Index to the Plates" (8.xvii) points out, the following pasaage refers to this plate:
“The Abbeville architect put his sword to the knot perhaps rather too sharply. Vexed by the want of unity between his two windows, he literally laid their heads together, and so distorted their ogee curves, as to leave only one of the trefoiled panels above, on the inner side, and three on the outer side of each arch. The arrange- ment is given in Plate XII., fig. 3. Associated with the various undulation of flamboyant curves below, it is in the real tower hardly observed, while it binds it into one mass in general effect. Granting it, however, to be ugly and wrong, I like sins of the kind, for the sake of the courage it requires to commit them.” (p. 211)
Scanned image and text by George P. Landow