Identifier: storyofarchitect00math (find matches)
Title: The story of architecture: an outline of the styles in all countries
Year: 1896 (1890s)
Authors: Mathews, Charles Thompson, 1863-
Subjects: Architecture -- History
Publisher: New York, D. Appleton and company
Contributing Library: New York Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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tem-ples or other Roman build-ings, and the wooden doorswere richly embossed withplates of chased bronze. Inside, long lines of col-umns, of either the Corin-thinian or Ionic orders, andusually carrying arches,formed the principal archi-tectural feature. The wallsof the transept and apse wereincrusted with mosaics ofgreen and gold, purple anddeep blue, while sacred em-blems, figures of saints, andrepresentations of the headof our Lord, all executed inglass or precious marbles,were skilfully inlaid at well-chosen intervals. The roofs were eitheropen trusses or flat, with sunken panels framed ingilded mouldings, and the floors were tessellated inmarble, having nearly always a huge circle of crim-son porphyry, called the rota, near the entrance, onwhich certain of the worshippers knelt for prayer. Sometimes the walls above the arches of a navewere carried up unbroken to the roof, but moreoften there were galleries for the women over theside aisles which had their outlook into the body of
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Fig. 92.—Plan of the Basilicaof St. Paul beyond the walls. 246 EARLY CHRISTIAN ARCHITECTURE. the church through windows. These windows, per-haps because they were grouped in threes by thelater Gothic architects, gained the sobriquet of tri-forium. Other openings above these (Fig. 91) formedthe clerestory for additional light. One of the most beautiful basilicas of the earlyChristian style was the Old Basilica of St. Paul be-yond the Walls (Fig. 92), founded in 388 A. D. byTheodosius and Valentinian II, completed by Hono-rius, and restored, elaborated, and enriched by vari-ous Popes, especially Leo III. It is also interestingin being the last five-aisled basilica built in Italy, savethat of St. John Lateran, which belongs to the tenthcentury and the time of Sergius III and so may becounted as practically a member of the next archi-tectural period. A marble colonnade formed the approach fromthe Tiber to this basilica, and in mediaeval times acovered arcade joined it to the city. The i

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