Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1998. Vol. 2. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 26)
Studies - Endre Abkarovits: Teaching the Englishness of English Gothic cathedral architecture
cathedrals in the field of tracery. The Europe-wide fashion of applying naturalistic leaf sculpture was best shown here, as well as at Lincoln and Southwell. But the decorated cathedral 'par excellence' is Exeter, which, apart from the above mentioned two Norman towers, was wholly built in Decorated 'with greater stylistic consistency than any other pre-Reformation English cathedral except Salisbury.' (Clifton-Taylor: 147) In Exeter the ribs starting from the springer take almost the shape of palm trees during the Decorated period. The origin of these palm tree-like ribs was the chapter house, a typical English building-type. The archetype was the Westminster Chapter House, English in its octagonal shape, but having huge French traceried windows. (1253) One of the highlights of many English cathedrals is their Decorated chapter house. (Wells, York, Salisbury, etc) This building type is, however, not a new invention of the Decorated, as we know circular (eg Worcester from the Norman period) and poligonal (eg Lincoln or Lichfield from the mid thirteenth century) examples before them, having basically the same arrangement. But Decorated chapter houses surpass the others in beauty. The English did not have many rose windows. They had more and more complicated bar tracery instead. The square Eastern ending made the erection of an enormous Eastern window with rich bar tacery possible. First simple geometric elements (circles, quatrefoils, trefoils, etc) were used during the Decorated period (Lincoln), which were later followed by less attractive and less fanciful Perpendicular divisions (York, Gloucester). The roof of the Eastern termination rose in the north and east of England sheer from ground to apex, in the south and west the high gable is set back from the East end, in the latter case enabling the erection of two big Eastern windows, one for the choir, the other for the Lady Chapel. (Harvey: 74) Instead of the gloom of French cathedral terminations, England tends to have more and more light at the Eastern end till the whole Eastern wall is transformed into a glass-wall of the size of a tennis-court at Gloucester. These huge Eastern windows are however rather unimaginative in their design. (Clifton-Taylor: 213) It is usual to divide the Decorated period into Geometric and Curvelinear. After the simple forms of tracery in the Geometric period, which could be drawn with the help of a liner and compasses, in the first half of the 14 th century, for the first time in the history of Gothic arts, its ruling arch form, the pointed one was abandoned for the sake of the ogee arch, which had existed in Islam arts long before. One of the most famous examples is the Lady Chapel at Ely. (1335-1349) Another unique feature of Ely from this period is the octagon and lantern for the crossing, which may be a deliberate 59
