File:Architecture, classic and early Christian (1888) (14577588188).jpg

Identifier: architectureclas00smit (find matches)
Title: Architecture, classic and early Christian
Year: 1888 (1880s)
Authors: Smith, T. Roger (Thomas Roger), 1830-1903 Slater, John, 1847-1924
Subjects: Architecture Church architecture
Publisher: London : S. Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, Ltd., St. Dunstan's House, Fetter, Lane, Fleet Street, E.C.
Contributing Library: NCSU Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: NCSU Libraries

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lpits are termed ambos. Below the Church of SanClemente is a vaulted structure or crypt extending underthe greater part, but not the whole, of the floor of themain building. The description given above would apply, with veryslight variations, to any one of the many ancient basilicachurches in Eome, Milan, Eavenna, and the other oldercities of Italy; the principal variations being that inmany instances, including the very ancient basilica ofSt. Peter, now destroyed, the avenues all stopped short ofthe end wall of the basilica, and a wide and clear trans-verse space or transept ran athwart them in front of theapse. San Clemente indeed shows some faint traces ofsuch a feature. In one or two very large churches fiveavenues occur,—that is to say, a nave and double aisles;and in Santa Agnese (Fig. 156a) and at least one other, wefind a gallery over the side aisles opening into the nave,or, as Mr. Fergusson puts it, the side aisles in twostories. In many instances we should find no atrium.
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BASILICAS. 203 Lut in all cases we meet with the nave and aisles, and theapse at the end of the nave, with its arch and its elevatedfloor; and the entrances are always at the end of theLnilding farthest from the r.pse, witk some sort of porchor portal. The interest of these buildings lies not so much in theirvenerable antiqnity as in tlie fact that the airangementsof all Christian chnrches in Western Europe down to theHeformation, and of very many since, are directly derivedfrom these originals. If the reader will refer to thedescription of a Gothic cathedral in the companion volumeof this series,* it will not be diriicult for hiiu to trace thecorresjoondence between its plan and its general structureand those of the primitive basilica. The atrium no long tforms the access to a cathedral, but it still survives in thecloister, though in a changed position. The narthe.x. orporch is still more or less traceable in the great westernportals, and in a kind of separation which often, but not

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