Mural decoration

MURAL DECORATION

THERE is scarcely one of the numerous branches of decorative art which has not at some time or other been applied to the ornamenting of wall-surfaces. It will be convenient to classify the various methods under different heads.

1. Reliefs sculptured in Marble or Stone.— This is the oldest method of wall-decoration, of which numerous examples still exist. The tombs and temples of Egypt are very rich in this kind of mural ornament of various dates, extending over the enormous period of nearly 5000 years. These sculptures are, as a rule, carved in very low relief; in many cases they are “counter-sunk,” that is, the most projecting parts of the figures do not extend beyond the flat surface of the ground. Some unfinished reliefs discovered in the rock-cut tombs of Thebes show the manner in which the sculptor set to work. The plain surface of the stone was marked out by red lines into a number of squares of equal size. The use of this was probably twofold: first, as a guide in enlarging the design from a small drawing, a method still commonly practised; second, to help the artist to draw his figures with just proportions, following the very strict canons which were laid down by the Egyptians. No excessive realism or individuality of style arising from a careful study of the lifemodel was permitted. When the surface had been covered with these squares, the artist drew with a brush dipped in red the outlines of his relief, and then cut round them with his chisel.

When the relief was finished, it was, as a rule, entirely painted over with much minuteness and great variety of colours. More rarely the ground was left the natural tint of the stone or marble, and only the figures and hieroglyphs painted. In the case of sculpture in hard basalt or granite the painting appears often to have been omitted altogether. The utter absence of perspective effects and the severe self-restraint of the sculptors in the matter of composition show a keen sense of artistic fitness in this kind of decoration. That the stern rigidity of these sculptured pictures did not in any way arise from want of skill or observation of nature on the part of the artists is at once apparent when we examine their representations of birds and animals; with the most unerring skill and precision the special characteristics of each creature and species were caught by the ancient Egyptian and reproduced in stone or colour, not literally, but in a half-symbolic way, suggesting exactly those peculiarities of form, plumage, or movement which are the essence and “differentia” of each, all other ideas bearing less directly on the point being carefully eliminated.

The subjects of these great mural sculptures are endless in their variety; almost every possible incident in man’s life here or beyond the grave is reproduced with the closest attention to detail. The tomb of Tih at Sakkarah (about 4500 b.c. ) has some of the finest and earliest specimens of these mural sculptures, especially rich in illustrations of the every-day domestic life and occupations of the Egyptians. The later tombs, as a rule, have sculptures depicting the religious ritual and belief of the people, and the temples combine these hieratic subjects with the history of the reigns and victories of the Egyptian kings.

The above remarks as to style and manner of execution may be applied also to the wall-sculptures from the royal palaces of Nineveh and Babylon, the finest of which are shown by inscriptions to date from the time of Sennacherib to that of Sardanapalus (from 705 to 625 b.c.). These are carved in very low relief with almost gem-like delicacy of detail on enormous slabs of white marble. The sacred subjects, generally representing the king worshipping one of the numerous Assyrian gods, are mostly large, often colossal in scale. The other subjects, illustrating the life and amusements of the king, his prowess in war or hunting, or long processions of prisoners and tribute-bearers coming to do him homage, are generally smaller and in some cases very minute in scale (fig. 1). The arrangement of these reliefs in long horizontal bands, and their reserved conventional treatment are somewhat similar to those of ancient Egypt, but they show a closer attention to anatomical truth and a greater love for strong dramatic effect than any of the Egyptian reliefs. As in the art of Egypt, birds and animals are treated with far greater realism than human figures. The plastic art of no period or country has ever surpassed in skill and life-like truth the Assyrian reliefs of horses, mules, hounds, goats, lions, and many other animals. A relief in the British Museum, representing a lioness wounded by an arrow in her spine and dragging helplessly her paralysed hind legs, affords an example of wonderful truth and pathos. Very remarkable technical skill is shown in all these sculptures by the way in which the sculptors have obtained the utmost amount of effect with the smallest possible amount of relief (see Babylonia, vol. iii. p. 190), in this respect calling strongly to mind a similar peculiarity in the work of the Florentine Donatello.

The palace at Mashita on the hajj road in Moab, built by the Sasanian Chosroes II. (614-627 a.d.), is ornamented on the exterior with very beautiful surface sculpture in stone. The designs of this are of peculiar interest as forming an evident link between Assyrian and Byzantine art, and they are not remotely connected with the decoration on Moslem buildings of comparatively modern date.

Especially in Italy during the Middle Ages a similar treatment of marble in low relief was frequently used for wall-decoration. The most notable example is the beautiful series of reliefs on the west front of Orvieto cathedral, the work of Giovanni P⅛ano and his pupils in the early part of the 14th century. These are small reliefs, illustrative of the Old and New Testaments, of most graceful design and skilful execution. A growth of branching foliage serves to unite and frame the tiers of subjects.

Of a widely different class, but of considerable importance in the history of mural decoration, are the very beautiful reliefs, sculptured in stone and marble, with which Moslem buildings in many parts of the world are ornamented. These are mostly geometrical patterns of great intricacy and beauty, which cover large surfaces, frequently broken up into panels by bands of more flowing ornament or Arabic inscriptions. The mosques of Cairo, India, and Persia, and the domestic Moslem buildings of Spain are extremely rich in this magnificent method of decoration. In western Europe, especially during the 15 th century, stone panelled-work with rich tracery formed a large part of the scheme of decoration in all the more splendid buildings. Akin to this, though without actual relief, is the very sumptuous stone tracery,—inlaid flush into rough flint walls,—which was a mode of ornament largely used for enriching the exteriors of churches in the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. It is almost peculiar to that district, and is an admirable example of the skill and taste with which the mediaeval builders adapted their method of ornamentation to the materials which came naturally to hand.

2. Marble Veneer.— Another widely-used method of mural decoration has been the application of thin marble linings to wall-surfaces, the decorative effect being produced by the natural beauty of the marble itself and not by sculptured reliefs. One of the oldest buildings in the world, the so-called “Temple of the Sphinx” among the Gizeh pyramids, is built of great blocks of granite, the inside of the rooms being lined with slabs of beautiful semi-transparent African alabaster about 3 inches thick. In the 1st century very thin veneers of richly-coloured marbles were largely used by the Romans to decorate brick and stone walls. Pliny (7/. N., xxxvi. 6) speaks of this practice as being a new and degenerate invention in his time. Many examples exist at Pompeii and in other Roman buildings. Numerous Byzantine churches, such as St Saviour’s at Constantinople, and St George’s, Thessalonica, have the lower part of the internal walls richly ornamented in this way. It was commonly used to form a dado, the upper part of the building being covered with mosaic. The cathedral of Monreale and other Siculo-Norman buildings owe a great deal of their splendour to these linings of richly-variegated marbles. In most cases the main surface is of light-coloured marble or alabaster, inlaid bands of darker tint or coloured mosaic being used to divide the surface into panels. The peculiar Italian-Gothic of northern and central Italy during the 14th and 15th centuries, and at Venice some centuries earlier, relied greatly for its effects on this treatment of marble. St Mark’s at Venice and the cathedral of Florence are magnificent examples of this work used externally. It is in every case a mere skin, and is in no way connected with the stability of the structure. Both inside and out most of the richest examples of Moslem architecture owe much to this method of decoration; the mosques and palaces of India and Persia are in many cases completely lined with the most lustrous and brilliant sorts of marble, of contrasting tints arranged and fitted together with consummate skill and knowledge of harmony.

3. Wall-Linings of Glazed Bricks or Tiles.— This is a very important class of decoration, and from its almost imperishable nature, its richness of colour, and its brilliance of surface is capable of producing a splendour of effect that can only be rivalled by glass mosaics. In the less important form—that of bricks modelled or stamped in relief with figures and inscriptions, and then coated with a brilliant colour in siliceous enamel—it was largely used by the ancient Egyptians and Assyrians as well as by the later Sasanians of Persia. In the 11th and 12th centuries the Moslems of Persia brought this art to great perfection, and used it on a large scale, chiefly, though not invariably, for internal walls. The main surfaces were covered by thick earthenware tiles, overlaid with a white enamel. These were not rectangular, but of various shapes, mostly some form of a star, arranged so as to fit closely together. Very delicate and minute patterns were then painted on the tiles, after the first firing, in a copper-like colour with strong metallic lustre, produced by the deoxidization of a metallic salt in the process of the second firing. Bands and friezes with Arabic inscriptions, modelled boldly in high relief, were used to break up the monotony of the surface. In these, as a rule, the projecting letters were painted blue, and the flat ground enriched with very minute patterns in the lustre-colour. This combination of bold relief and delicate painting produces great vigour and richness of effect, equally telling whether viewed in the mass or closely examined tile by tile. In the 15th century lustre-colours, though still largely employed fσr plates, vases, and other vessels, especially in Spain, were but little used for tiles; and another class of ware, rich in the variety and brilliance of its colours, was extensively used by Moslem builders all over the Mohammedan world. The most sumptuous sorts of tiles used for wall coverings are those of the so-called “Rhodian” and Damascus wares, the work of Persian potters at many places. Those made at Rhodes are coarsely executed in comparison with the produce of the older potteries at Ispahan and Damascus (see Pottery). These are rectangular tiles of earthenware, covered with a white “slip” and painted in the most brilliant colours with slightly conventionalized representations of various flowers, especially the rose, the hyacinth, and the carnation. The red used is a very rich harmonious colour, applied in considerable body, so as to stand out in slight relief. Another class of design is more geometrical, forming regular repeats; but the most beautiful compositions are those in which the natural growth of trees and flowers is imitated, the branches and blossoms spreading freely over a large surface covered by hundreds of tiles without any repetition. One of the finest examples is the “Mecca wall” in the mosque of Ibrâhîm Agha, Cairo; and other Egyptian mosques are adorned in the same magnificent way (fig. 2). Another variety, the special production of Damascus, has the design almost entirely executed iι. blue. It was about the year 1600 a.d., in the reign of Shah Abbas I., that this class of pottery was brought to greatest perfection, and it is in Persia that the most magnificent examples of its use are to be found. Nothing can surpass the splendour of effect produced by these tilecoverings, varieties of which, dating from the 12th to the 17th centuries, were largely used in all the chief buildings of Persia. The most remarkable examples for beauty of design and extent of surface covered by these tiles are the mosque at Tabriz, built by Ali Khoja in the 12th century, the ruined tomb of Sultan Khodabend (1303- 1316 a.d.) at Sultanieh, the palace of Shah Abbas I. and the tomb of Abbas II. (ob. 1666 a.d.) at Ispahan, all of which buildings are covered almost entirely inside and out with this magnificent sort of decoration.

Another important class of wall-tiles are those manufactured by the Spanish Moors, called “azulejos,” especially during the 14th century. These are in a very different style, being designed to suggest or imitate mosaic. They have intricate interlacing geometrical patterns marked out by lines in slight relief; brilliant enamel colours were then burned into the tile, the projecting lines forming boundaries for the pigments. A very rich effect is produced by this combination of relief and colour. They are mainly used for dados about 4 feet high, often surmounted by a band of tiles with painted inscriptions. The Alhambra and Generalife palaces at Granada, begun in the 13th century, but mainly built and decorated by Yùsuf I. and Mohammed V. (1333-1391 a.d.), and the Alcazar at Seville have the most beautiful examples of these “azulejos.” The latter building chiefly owes its decorations to Pedro the Cruel (1364 a.d.), who employed Moorish workmen for its tile-coverings and other ornaments. Many other buildings in southern Spain are enriched in the same way, some as late as the 16th century.

Almost peculiar to Spain are a variety of wall-tile the work of Italians in the 16th and 17th centuries. These are effective, though rather coarsely painted, and have a rich yellow as the predominant colour. The Casa de Pilatos and Isabel’s chapel in the Alcazar palace, both at Seville, have the best specimens of these, dating about the year 1500. In other Western countries tiles have been used more for pavements than for wall-decoration.

4. Wall-Coverings of Hard Stucco, frequently enriched with Reliefs.— The Greeks and Romans possessed the secret of making a very beautiful hard kind of stucco, creamy in colour, and capable of receiving a polish like that of marble; it would stand exposure to the weather. Those of the early Greek temples which were built, not of marble, but of stone, such as the Doric temples at Aegina, Phigaleia, Paestum, and Agrigentum, were all entirely coated inside and out with this beautiful material—itself pleasant both in texture and hue, and an admirable surface for the further polychromatic decoration with which all Greek buildings seem to have been ornamented. Another highly artistic use of stucco among the Greeks and Romans for the interiors of buildings consisted in covering the walls and vaults with a smooth coat, on which while still wet the outlines of figures, groups, and other ornaments were sketched with a point; more stucco was then applied in lumps and rapidly modelled into delicate reliefs before it had time to set. Some tombs in Magna Graecia of the 4th century b.c. are decorated in this way with figures of nymphs, cupids, animals, and wreaths, all of which are models of grace and elegance, both in form and action, and extremely remarkable for the dexterous way in which a few rapid touches of the modelling tool or thumb have produced a work of the highest artistic beauty and spirit (fig. 3). Roman specimens of this sort of decoration are very common, fine examples have been found in the baths of Titus and numerous tombs near Rome, as well as in many of the houses of Pompeii. These are mostly executed with great skill and frequently with good taste, though in some cases, especially at Pompeii, elaborate architectural compositions with awkward attempts at effects of violent perspective, modelled in slight relief on flat wall-surfaces, produce a very unpleasing effect. Other Pompeian examples, where the surface is divided into flat panels, each containing a figure or group, have great merit for their delicate richness of effect, without offending against the canons of wall - decoration, one of the first conditions of which is that no attempt should be made to disguise the fact of its being a solid wall and a flat surface.

The Moslem architects of the Middle Ages, who excelled in almost all possible methods of mural decoration, made great use of stucco ornament in the most elaborate and magnificent way, both for external and internal walls. The stucco is modelled in high or low relief in great variety of geometrical patterns, of wonderful beauty and richness, alternating with bands of more flowing ornament, or long Arabic inscriptions. Many of their buildings, such as the mosque of Tuhin at Cairo (879 a,d.), owe nearly all their beauty to this fine stucco work, the purely architectural shell of the structure being often quite simple and devoid of ornament. These stucco reliefs were, as a rule, further decorated with delicate painting in gold and colours, producing an effect of indescribable beauty and splendour. The Moorish tower at Segovia in Spain is a good example of this class of ornament used externally. With the exception of a few bands of brick and the stone quoins at the angles, the whole exterior of the tower is covered with a network of stucco reliefs in simple geometrical patterns. The Alhambra at Granada and the Alcazar at Seville have the richest examples of this work, both in the delicate intricacy of the designs and in the brilliant colours with which they are painted. The lower part of the walls is lined with marble or tiles to a height of about 4 feet, and above that in many cases the whole surface is encrusted with these reliefs, the varied surface of which, by producing endless gradations of shadow, takes away any possible harshness or over-gaudiness from the brilliance of the gold and colours (fig. 4).

During the 16th century, and even earlier, stucco wall-reliefs were used with considerable skill and decorative effect in Italy, England, and other Western countries. Perhaps the most graceful examples are the reliefs with which Vasari in the 16th century encrusted pillars and other parts of the court in the Florentine Palazzo Vecchio, built of plain stone by Michelozzi in 1454. These are very beautiful reliefs, some of flowing vines and other plants winding spirally round the columns. The English examples of this work are very effectively designed, though coarser in execution. The outside of an old half-timbered house in the market-place at Newark-upon-Trent has high reliefs in stucco of canopied figures, dating from the end of the 15th century. The counties of Essex and Suffolk are very rich in examples of this work used externally; and many 16th-century houses in England have fine internal stucco decoration, especially Hardwicke Hall (Derbyshire), one of the rooms of which has the upper part of the wall enriched with life-sized stucco figures in high relief, forming a deep frieze all round. The best English stucco work of this sort is very remarkable for its freedom and spirit of design, as well as for certain grace of line, which is a survival of the old mediaeval sense of beauty, then rapidly passing away.

5. Sgraffito.— This is a variety of stucco work used chiefly in Italy from the 16th century downwards, and employed only for exteriors of buildings, especially the palaces of Tuscany and northern Italy. The process is this. The wall is covered with a coat of stucco made black by an admixture of charcoal; over this a second very thin coat of white stucco is laid. When it is all hard the design is produced by cutting and scratching away the white skin, so as to show the black under-coat. Thus the drawing appears in black on a white ground. This work is effective at a distance, as it requires a bold style of handling, in which the shadows are indicated by cross-hatched lines more or less near together. Flowing arabesques mixed with grotesque figures occur most frequently in sgraffito. It is still largely practised in northern Italy, and has been used with success in the external decoration of the South Kensington Academy of Music.

6. Stamped Leather.— This was a very magnificent and expensive form of wall-hanging, chiefly used during the 16th and 17th centuries. Skins, generally of goats or calves, were well tanned and cut into rectangular shapes. They were then covered with silver leaf, which was varnished with a transparent yellow lacquer, making the silver look like gold. The skins were then stamped or embossed with patterns in relief, formed by heavy pressure from metal dies, one in relief and the other sunk. The reliefs were then painted by hand in many colours, generally brilliant in tone. Italy and Spain (especially Cordova) were important seats of this manufacture; and in the 17 th century a large quantity was produced in France. Fig. 5 gives a good example of Italian stamped leather of the 16th century. In England, chiefly at Norwich, this manufacture was carried on in the 17th and 18th centuries, in many cases of very excellent design. In durability and richness of effect stamped leather surpasses most other forms of movable wall-decoration.

7. Painted Cloth. —Another form of wall-hanging, used most largely during the 15th and 16th centuries, and in a less extensive way a good deal earlier, is canvas painted to imitate tapestry. English mediaeval inventories both of ecclesiastical and domestic goods frequently contain items such as these: “stayned cloths for hangings,” “paynted cloths with stories and batailes,” or “paynted cloths of beyond sea work,” or “of Flaunder’s work.” Many good artists working at Ghent and Bruges during the first half of the 15 th century produced very fine work of this class, as well as designs for real tapestry. Several of the great Italian artists devoted their utmost skill in composition and invention to the painting of these wall-hangings. The most important existing example is the magnificent series of paintings of the triumph of Julius Caesar executed by Andrea Mantegna (1485-1492) for Ludovico Gonzaga, duke of Mantua, and now at Hampton Court. These are usually, but wrongly, called “cartoons,” as if they were designs meant to be executed in tapestry; this is not the case, as the paintings themselves were used as wall-hangings. They are nine in number, and each compartment, 9 feet square, was separated from the next by a pilaster. They form a continuous procession, with life-sized figures of unrivalled grace and beauty, remarkable alike for their composition, drawing, and delicate colouring,—the latter unfortunately much disguised by the most coarse and tasteless “restoration.” Like most of these painted wall-hangings, they are executed in tempera, and rather thinly painted, so that the pigment might not crack off through the cloth falling slightly into folds. Another remarkable series of painted cloth hangings are those at Rheims cathedral, admirable for their noble breadth of design and rich colouring. In some cases actual dyes were used for this sort of work. A MS. of the 15th century gives receipts for “painted cloth,” showing that sometimes they were dyed in a manner similar to those Indian stuffs which were afterwards printed, and are now called chintzes. These receipts are for real dyes, not for pigments, and among them is the earliest known description of the process called

“setting” the woad or indigo vat, as well as a receipt for removing or “discharging” the colour from a cloth already dyed. Another method employed was a sort of “encaustic” process; the cloth was rubbed all over with wax, and then painted in tempera; heat was then applied so that the colours sank into the melting wax, and were thus firmly fixed upon the cloth.

8. Printed Hangings and Wall-Papers.— The printing of various textiles with dye-colours and mordants is probably one of the most ancient of the arts. Pliny (H. N., χχχv,) clearly describes a dyeing process employed by the ancient Egyptians, in which the pattern was probably formed by printing from blocks. Various methods have been used for this work — wood blocks in relief, engraved metal plates, stencil plates, and even hand-painting; frequently two or more of these methods have been employed for the same pattern. The use of printed stuffs is of great antiquity among the Hindus and Chinese, and was certainly practised in western Europe in the 13th century, and perhaps earlier. The »South Kensington Museum has 13th-century specimens of block-printed silk made in Sicily, of very beautiful design. Towards the end of the 14th century a great deal of block-printed linen was made in Flanders, and largely imported into England.

Wall-papers did not come into common use in Europe till the 18th century, though they appear to have been used much earlier by the Chinese. A few rare examples exist in England which may be as early as the 16th century; these are imitations, generally in flock, of the fine old Florentine and Genoese cut velvets, and hence the style of the design in no way shows the date of the wallpaper, the same traditional patterns being reproduced for many years with little or no change. Machinery enabling paper to be made in long strips was not invented till the end of the last century, and up to that time wall-papers were printed on small square pieces of hand-made paper, difficult to hang, disfigured by numerous joints, and comparatively costly; on these accounts wall-papers were slow in superseding the older and more magnificent modes of mural decoration, such as wood-panelling, painting, tapestry, stamped leather, and painted cloth. A little work by Jackson of Battersea, printed in London in 1744, throws some light on the use of wall-papers at that time. He gives reduced copies of his designs, mostly taken from Italian pictures or antique sculpture during his residence in Venice. Instead of flowing patterns covering the wall, his designs are all pictures — landscapes, architectural scenes, or statues—treated as panels, with plain paper or painting between. They are all printed in oil, with wooden blocks worked with a rolling press, apparently an invention of his own. They are all in the worst possible taste, and yet are offered as great improvements on the Chinese papers which he says were then in fashion.

The method of printing wall-papers of the better sort is probably the same now that it has always been. Wooden blocks with the design cut in relief, one for each colour, are applied by hand, after being dipped in an elastic cloth sieve charged with wet tempera pigment, great care being taken to lay each block exactly on the right place, so that the various colours may “register” or fit together. In order to suit the productions of the paper-mills these blocks are made, in England 21 inches wide, and in France 18 inches wide; the length of the block is limited to what the workman can easily lift with one hand,—2 feet being about the limit, as the blocks are necessarily thick, and in many cases made heavier by being inlaid with copper, especially the thin outlines, which, if made of wood, would not stand the wear and tear of printing. In “flock” and gold or silver printing the design is first printed in strong size; the flock (finely cut wool of the required colour), or metallic powder is then sprinkled by hand all over the paper; it adheres only to the wet size, and is easily shaken off the ground or unsized part. If the pattern is required to stand out in some relief this process is repeated several times, and the whole paper then rolled to compress the flock. Cheaper sorts of paper are printed by machinery, the design being cut on the surface of wooden rollers, under which the paper passes. The chief drawback to this process is that all the colours are applied rapidly one after the other, w ithout allowing each to dry separately, as is done in hand printing. A somewhat blurred appearance is the usual result.

Though at first wall-papers were a mere makeshift and feeble imitation of rich textiles, yet, with a good feeling for the harmonies of colour and a regard for the technical necessities of the process, very rich and beautiful effects may be produced at a comparatively small cost if handprinting be adopted. Imitations of stamped leather are now produced with great success, though of inferior durability. Very thick tough paper is used for this, and treated in the same way as the real skins mentioned above. Fig. 6 is a good English example of 18th-century wall paper printed on squares of stout hand-made paper 22 inches wide. The design is apparently copied from an Indian chintz.

Painting.

This is naturally the most important and the most widely used of all forms of wall-decoration, as well as perhaps the earliest.

Egyptian Paintings.— Egypt is the chief storehouse of ancient specimens of this, as of almost all the arts. Owing to the intimate connexion between the sculpture and paint ing of early times, the remarks above both as to subjects and treatment under the head of Egyptian wall-sculpture will to a great extent apply also to the paintings. It is a very important fact, and one which testifies clearly to the enormous antiquity of Egyptian civilization, that the earliest paintings, dating more than 4000 years before our era, are also the cleverest both in drawing and execution. In later times the influence of Egyptian art, especially in painting, was very important among even very distant nations. In the 6th century b.c. Egyptian colonists, introduced by Cambyses into Persepolis, largely influenced the painting and sculpture of the great Persian empire and throughout the valley of the Euphrates. In a lesser degree the art of Babylon and Nineveh had felt considerable Egyptian influence several centuries earlier. The same influence affected the early art of the Greeks and the Etrurians, and it was not till the middle of the 5th century b.c. that the further development and perfecting of art in Greece obliterated the old traces of Egyptian mannerism. After the death of Alexander the Great, when Egypt came into the possession of the Lagidae (320 b.c. ), the tide of influence flowed the other way, and Greek art modified though it did not seriously alter the characteristics of Egyptian painting and sculpture, which still retained much of their early formalism and severity. And yet the increased sense of beauty, especially in the human face, derived from the Greeks was counterbalanced by loss of vigour and force; art under the Ptolemies ceased to have a real life and became a mere dull copyism of earlier traditions.

The general scheme of mural painting in the buildings of ancient Egypt was very complete and magnificent. Columns, mouldings, and other architectural features were enriched with patterns in brilliant colours; the flat wallspaces were covered with figure-subjects, generally in horizontal bands, and the ceilings were richly ornamented with sacred symbols, such as the vulture, or painted blue and studded with gold stars to symbolize the sky. The wall-paintings are executed in tempera on a thin skin of fine lime, laid over the brick, stone, or marble to form a smooth and slightly absorbent coat to receive the pigments, which were most brilliant in tone and of great variety of tint. Not employing fresco, the Egyptian artists were not restricted to “earth colours,” but occasionally used purples, pinks, and greens which would have been destroyed by fresh lime. The blue used is a very beautiful colour, and is generally laid on in considerable body—it is frequently a “smalt” or deep-blue glass, coloured by copper oxide, finely powdered. Red and yellow ochre, carbon-black, and powdered chalk-white are most largely used. Though in the paintings of animals and birds considerable realism is often seen (fig. 7), yet for human figures certain conventional colours are employed, e.g., white for females’ flesh, red for the males, or black to indicate people of negro race. Heads are painted in profile, and little or no shading is used. Considerable knowledge of harmony is shown in the arrangement of the colours; and otherwise harsh combinations of tints are skilfully softened and brought into keeping by thin separating lines of white or yellow. Though at first sight the general colouring, if seen in a museum, may appear crude and gaudy, yet it should be remembered that the internal paintings were much softened by the very dim light that was sparingly admitted into Egyptian buildings, and those outside were subdued by contrast with the brilliant blue sky and glowing sunshine under which they were always seen. Etruscan Painting.— The rock-cut sepulchres of the Etrurians (see Etruria, vol. viii. p. 645) supply the only existing specimens of their mural painting; and, unlike the tombs of Egypt, only a small proportion appear to have been decorated in this way. The actual dates of these paintings are very uncertain, but they range possibly from about the 8th century b.c. down to almost the Christian era. The tombs which possess these paintings are mostly square-shaped rooms, with slightly-arched or gabled roofs, excavated in soft sandstone or tufa hillsides. The earlier ones show distinct Egyptian influence alike in drawing and in composition: they are very broadly designed with flat unshaded tints, the faces in profile, except the eyes, which are drawn as if seen in front. Colours, as in Egypt, are used conventionally—male flesh red, white or pale yellow for the females, black for demons. In one respect these paintings differ from those of the Egyptians; very few colours are used—red, brown, and yellow ochres, carbon-black, lime or chalk-white, and occasionally blue are the only pigments. The rock-walls are prepared by being covered with a thin skin of lime stucco, and lime or chalk is mixed in small quantities with all the colours; hence the restriction to “earth pigments,” made doubly necessary by the constant dampness of these subterranean chambers. The process employed was in fact a kind of fresco, though the stucco ground was not applied in small patches only sufficient for the day’s work the dampness of the rock was enough to keep the stucco skin moist, and so allow the necessary infiltration of colour from the surface. Many of these paintings when first discovered were quite fresh in tint and uninjured by time, but they are soon dulled by exposure to light. In the course of centuries great changes of style naturally took place; the early Egyptian influence, probably brought to Etruria through the Phoenician traders, was succeeded by an even more strongly-marked Greek influence—at first archaic and stiff, then developing into great beauty of drawing, and finally yielding to the Roman spirit, as the degradation of Greek art advanced under their powerful but inartistic Roman conquerors.

Throughout this succession of styles—Egyptian, Greek, and Graeco-Roman—there runs a distinct undercurrent of individuality due to the Etruscans themselves. This appears not only in the drawing but also in the choice of subjects. In addition to pictures of banquets with musicians and dancers, hunting and racing scenes, the workshops of different craftsmen and other domestic subjects, all thoroughly Hellenic in sentiment, other paintings occur which are very un-Greek in feeling. These represent the judgment and punishment of souls in a future life. Mantus, Charun, and other infernal deities of the Rasena, hideous in aspect and armed with hammers, or furies, depicted as black bearded demons winged and brandishing live snakes, terrify or torture shrinking human souls. Others, and not the earliest in date, represent human sacrifices, such as those at the tomb of Patroclus— a class of subjects which, though Homeric, appears but rarely to have been selected by Greek painters. The constant import into Etruria of large quantities of fine Greek painted vases appears to have largely contributed to keep up the supremacy of Hellenic influence during many cen turies, and by their artistic superiority to have prevented the development of a more original and native school of art. Though we now know Etruscan painting only from the tombs, yet Pliny mentions (H. E r ., xxxv. 3) that fine wall-paintings existed in his time, with colours yet fresh, on the walls of ruined temples at Ardea and Lanuvium, executed, he says, before the founding of Rome. As before mentioned, the actual dates of the existing paintings are very uncertain. It cannot therefore be positively asserted that any existing specimens are much older than 600 b.c., though some, especially at Veii, certainly appear to have the characteristics of more remote antiquity. The most important of these paintings have been discovered in the cemeteries of Veii, Caere, Tarquinii, Vulci, Cervetri, and other Etruscan cities. Greek Painting.— This is a very obscure subject, for, although Strabo, Pliny, Pausanias, and others have left us minute descriptions of Greek paintings and ample accounts of painters and styles, yet of the pictures themselves almost nothing now remains. Even in Egypt the use of colour does not appear to have been more universal than it was among the Greeks, who applied it freely to their marble statues and reliefs, the whole of their buildings inside and out, as well as for the decoration of flat wall-surfaces. They appear to have cared but little for pure form, and not to have valued the delicate ivory-like tint and beautiful texture of their fine Pentelic and Parian marbles, except as a ground for coloured ornament. A whole class of artists, called αγαλ/ζάτων eγκaυ<rτai, were occupied in colouring marble sculpture, and the⅛ services were very highly valued. In some cases, probably for the sake of hiding the joints and getting a more absorbent surface, the marble, however pure and fine in texture, was covered with a thin skin of stucco made of mixed lime and powdered marble. Among the extremely rare specimens of Greek painting still existing, the most important is an alabaster sarcophagus, found in a tomb near Corneto, and now in the Etruscan museum at Florence. This is decorated outside with very beautiful and purely Greek paintings, executed on a stucco skin as hard and smooth as the alabaster itself. The pictures represent combats of the Greeks and Amazons, drawn with marvellous beauty of outline and grace of movement and composition. The colouring, though rather brilliant, is very simply treated, and the figures are kept strictly to one plane without any attempt at complicated perspective. Other most valuable specimens of Greek art, found at Herculaneum and now in the Naples museum, are some small paintings, one of girls playing with dice, another of Theseus and the Minotaur. These are painted with miniature-like delicacy on the bare surface of marble slabs; they are almost monochromatic, and are of the highest beauty both in drawing and in their skilfully-modelled gradations of shadow— quite unlike any of the Greek vase-paintings. The first-mentioned painting is signed ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ ΑΘΗΝΑΙΟΣ. It is probable that the strictly archaic paintings of the Greeks, such as those of Polygnotus in the 5th century b.c., executed with few and simple colours, had much resemblance to those on vases, but Pliny is certainly wrong when he asserts that, till the time of Apelles (c. 350-310 b.c. ), the Greek nainters onlv used black, white, red, and yellow. Judging from the peculiar way in which the Greeks and their imitators the Romans used the names of colours, it appears that they paid more attention to tones and relations of colour than to actual hues. Thus most Greek and Latin colour-names are now quite untranslatable. Homer’s “wine-like sea” (oΓvo^), Sophocles’s “wine-coloured ivy” (Oed. Col.), and Horace’s “purpureus olor” probably refer less to what we should call colour than to the chromatic strength of the various objects and their more or less strong powers of reflecting light, either in motion or when at rest. Nor have we any word like Virgil’s “flavus,” which could be applied both to a lady’s hair and to the leaf of an olive-tree.z

During the best periods of Greek art the favourite classes of subjects were scenes from poetry, especially Homer, and contemporary history. The names πινακοθήκη and στοά ποικίλη vferQ given to many public buildings from their walls being covered with paintings. Additional interest was given to the historical subjects by the introduction of portraits; e.g., in the great picture of the battle of Marathon (490 b.c.), on the walls of the στοά ποικίλη in Athens, portraits were given of the Greek generals Miltiades, Callimachus, and others. This picture was painted about forty years after the battle by Polygnotus and Micon. One of the earliest pictures recorded by Pliny (xxxv. 8) represented a battle of the Magnesians (c. 716 b.c. ); it was painted by Bularchus, a Lydian artist, and bought at a high price by King Candaules. Many other important Greek historical paintings are mentioned by Pausanias and earlier writers. The Pompeian mosaic of the defeat of the Persians by Alexander is probably a Romanized copy from some celebrated Greek painting; it obviously was not designed for mosaic work.

Landscape painting appears to have been unknown among the Greeks, even as a background to figure subjects. The poems especially of Homer and Sophocles show that this was not through want of appreciation of the beauties of nature, but partly, probably, because the main object of Greek painting was to tell some definite story, and also from their just sense of artistic fitness, which prevented them from attempting in their mural decorations to disguise the flat solidity of the walls by necessarily delusive effects of aerial perspective and distance.

It is interesting to note that even in the time of Alexander the Great the somewhat archaic works of the earlier painters were still highly appreciated. In particular Aristotle gives high praise to Polygnotus, both for his power of combining truth with idealization in his portraits and for his skill in depicting men’s mental characteristics; on this account he calls him ο ηθογράφος. Lucian too is no less enthusiastic, and praises Polygnotus alike for his grace, drawing, and colouring. Later painters, such as Zeuxis and Apelles, appear to have produced easel pictures more than mural paintings, and these, being easy to move, were mostly carried off to Rome by the early emperors. Hence Pausanias, who visited Greece in the time of Hadrian, mentions but few works of the later artists. Owing to the lack of existing specimens of Greek painting it would be idle to attempt an account of their technical methods, but no doubt those employed by the Romans described below were derived with the rest of their art from the Greeks. Speaking of their stucco, Pliny refers its superiority over that made by the Romans to the fact that it was always made of lime at least three years old, and that it was well mixed and pounded in a mortar before being laid on the wall; he is here speaking of the thick stucco in many coats, not of the thin skin mentioned above as being laid on marble.

Greek mural painting, like their sculpture, was chiefly used to decorate temples and public buildings, and comparatively rarely either for tombs or private buildings,— at least in the days of their early republican simplicity. They were in the true sense of the word works of monumental art, and were no doubt designed and executed with that strict self-restraint and due subordination to their architectural surroundings which we see so strongly marked in all Greek sculpture of the best periods. Roman Painting. — A very large number of Roman mural paintings now exist, of which by far the greatest quantity was discovered in the private houses and baths of Pompeii, nearly all dating between 63 a.d., when the city was ruined by an earthquake, and 79 a.d., when it was buried by Vesuvius. A catalogue of these and similar paintings from Herculaneum and Stabiae, compiled by Professor Helbig, comprises 1966 specimens. The excavations in the baths of Titus and other ancient buildings in Rome, made in the early part of the 16th century, excited the keenest interest and admiration among the painters of that time, and very largely influenced the later art of the Renaissance. These paintings, especially the “grotesques” or fanciful patterns of scroll-work and pilasters mixed with semi-realistic foliage and figures of boys, animals, and birds, designed with great freedom of touch and inventive power, seem to have thoroughly fascinated Raphael during his later period, and many of his pupils and contemporaries. The “loggie” of the Vatican and of the Farnesina palace are full of carefully-studied 16th-century reproductions of these highly-decorative paintings. Of late years the excavations on the Palatine and in the garden of the Farnesina in Rome have brought to light some mural paintings of the 1st century of our era, perhaps superior in execution even to the best of the Pompeian series.

The range of subjects found in Roman mural paintings is very large — mythology, religious ceremonies, genre, still life, and even landscape (the latter generally on a small scale, and treated in an artificial and purely decorative way), and lastly history. Pliny mentions several large and important historical paintings, such as those with which Valerius Maximus Messala decorated the walls of the Curia Hostilia, to commemorate his own victory over Hiero II. and the Carthaginians in Sicily in the 3d century b.c. The earliest Roman painting recorded by Pliny was by Fabius, sumamed Pictor, on the walls of the temple of Salus, executed about 300 b.c. (II. Λ τ ., XXXV. 4).

Unfortunately no existing Roman paintings seem to be earlier in date than the Christian era, and all belong to a period of decline in art. Pliny (xxxv. 1) laments the fact that the wealthy Romans of his time preferred the costly splendours of marble and porphyry wall-linings to the more artistic decoration of paintings by good artists. Historical painting seems then to have gone out of fashion; among the numerous specimens now existing very few from

Pompeii represent historical subjects; one has the scene of Masinissa and Sophonisba before Scipio, and another of a riot between the people of Pompeii and Nocera, which happened 59 a.d.

Mythological scenes, chiefly from Greek sources, occur most frequently: the myths of Eros and Dionysus are especial favourites. Only five or six relate to purely Roman mythology. We have reason to think that some at least of the Pompeian pictures are copies, probably at third or fourth hand, from celebrated Greek originals. The frequently repeated subjects of Medea meditating the murder of her children and Iphigenia at the shrine of the Tauric Artemis suggest that the motive and composition were taken from the celebrated originals of these subjects by Timanthes. Those of Io and Argus, the finest example of which is in the Palatine “villa of Livia,” and of Andromeda and Perseus, often repeated on Pompeian walls, may be from the originals by Nicias.

In many cases these mural paintings are of high artistic merit, though they are probably not the work of the most distinguished painters of the time, but rather of a humbler class of decorators, who reproduced, without much original invention, stock designs out of some pattern-book. They are, however, all remarkable for the rapid skill and extreme “verve” and freedom of hand with which the designs are, as it were, flung on to the walls with few but very effective touches. Though in some cases the motive and composition are superior to the execution, yet many of the paintings are remarkable both ’ for their realistic truth and technical skill. The great painting of Ceres from Pompeii, now in the Naples museum, is a work of the highest merit—the simple grandeur of the drawing and the delicate modelling of the flesh, executed in the easiest and most direct manner possible, are alike admirable. The round juiciness of the fruit in her basket, rapidly painted with a few telling strokes of the brush, recalls to mind in effect, though not in execution, the startling realism of the Dutch painters of still life, who laboured painfully to gain the effect produced with such rapidity and ease by the Roman artist. Fig. 8, from a Pompeian picture, is a fine example of good modelling of flesh.

In the usual scheme of decoration the broad wall-surfaces are broken up into a series of panels by pilasters, columns, or other architectural forms. Some of the panels contain pictures with figure-subjects; others have conventional ornament, or hanging festoons of fruit and flowers. The lower part of the λvall is painted one plain colour, forming a dado; the upper part sometimes has a well-designed frieze of flowing ornaments. In the better class of painted walls the whole is kept flat in treatment, and is free from too great subdivision, but in many cases great want of taste is shown by the introduction of violent effects of architectural perspective, and the space is broken up in a disagreeable way by complicated schemes of design, studded with pictures in varying scales which have but little relation to their surroundings. The colouring is on the whole very pleasant and harmonious—quite unlike the usual chromolithographic copies. Black, yellow, or a rich deep red are the favourite colours for the main ground of the walls, the pictures in the panels being treated separately, each with its Own background.

Technical Methods of the Romans.— Much has been written on this subject, and the most varying opinions have been expressed. The real fact appears to be that several methods were employed in each painting. First, the ground of the required colour was laid on while the stucco was still moist. This ground therefore was true fresco or “fresco buono.” On this, when dry, the various pictures and ornaments were painted in tempera. That the pictures themselves were not in true fresco is shown: (1) because the coloured ground always exists under the pictures; (2) by the wide distances apart of the “fresco edges” or joinings in the stucco, showing that a much larger area of stucco was applied at once than could have been covered with the frequently elaborate paintings before the stucco was dry; (3) by the fact that many of the brilliant pigments were not such as could have been used upon moist stucco. The next point is how these tempera paintings on the fresco ground were fixed so as to last for nearly eighteen hundred years uninjured by the damp which necessarily soaked through into the soil and ashes in which they were buried. This was probably effected by the ‘ ‘ encaustic” process (tyκaυσιs'). When the painting was finished and dry, hot melted wax was brushed all over it; and then a red-hot iron or brazier of burning charcoal was held near the face of the wall till, bit by bit, all the wax disappeared from the surface and soaked thoroughly into the absorbent stucco,—thus fixing the pigments with a vehicle that could stand the effects of damp. This application of hot wax appears to have been repeated more than once. The extreme smoothness of the fresco ground under the tempera pictures seems to show that the ground itself was both waxed and polished before the pictures were painted over it. By another method of encaustic the pigments themselves were mixed with hot wax, probably rendered more fluid and easy to work by the addition of some mineral · spirit or essential oil. The final application of heat to the painted surface blended the colours together and fixed them on and into the absorbent stucco ground. Vitruvius (vii. 9) describes the former process, in which the wax was applied after the colours were laid on the wall. According to him this was necessary in order to prevent the painted surface becoming patchy, especially in the case of the red ground made of vermilion, an oxide of mercury. This, as well as the evidence of the paintings themselves, shows that Pliny is mistaken in asserting that encaustic work could not be used for walls. Vitruvius (vii.) also gives an interesting account of the great care that was needed in preparing stucco for painting. Three coats of old slaked lime and sand were first to be laid, and then three more coats mixed with pounded white marble, each coat of more finely powdered marble than the one beneath; the last coat was to be polished till it gave a reflexion like a mirror. Damp or external walls were to be built hollow, and the cavity ventilated; this was sometimes done, e.g., in the Palatine villa, by facing the wall inside with hollow bricks or tiles, on which the stucco was laid. Vitruvius, who probably died shortly before the Christian era, laments the decay of taste in his time, much as Pliny does; he specially deprecates the use of gaudy red. lead, and the sham architectural paintings in which candelabra, reeds, and other incongruities are made to support heavy cornices and roofs of buildings. He complains also of the novel taste for expensive but inartistic colours, such as purple and azure. Early Christian Mural Paintings in Italy.— A very interesting series of these exists in various catacombs, especially those of Rome and Naples. They are of great value, both as an important link in the history of art and also as throwing considerable light on the mental· state of the early Christians, which was distinctly influenced by the older faith. Thus in the earlier paintings of about the 4th century we find Christ represented as a beardless youth, beautiful as the artist could make him, with a lingering tradition of Greek idealization, in no degree like the “Man of Sorrows” of mediaeval painters, but rather a kind of genius of Christianity in whose fair outward form the peace and purity of the new faith were visibly symbolized, just as certain distinct attributes were typified in the persons of the gods of ancient Greece. The favourite early subject, Christ the Good Shepherd (fig. 9), is represented as Orpheus playing on his lyre to a circle of beasts, the pagan origin of the picture being shown unmistakably by the Phrygian cap and by the presence of lions, panthers, and other incongruous animals among the listening sheep. In other cases Christ is depicted standing with a sheep borne on his shoulders like Hermes Criophoros or Hermes Psychopompos—favourite Greek subjects, especially the former, a statue of which Pausanias (ix. 22) mentions as existing at Tanagra in Bceotia. Here again the pagan origin of the type is shown by the presence in the catacomb paintings of the pan-pipes and pedum, special attributes of Hermes, but quite foreign to the notion of Christ. Though in a degraded form, a good deal survives in some of these paintings, especially in the earlier ones, of the old classical grace of composition and beauty of drawing, notably in the above-mentioned representations where old models were copied without any adaptation to their new meaning. Those of the 5th and 6th centuries still follow the classical lines, though in a rapidly deteriorating style, until the introduction of a foreign—the Byzantine—element, which created a fresh starting-point on quite different lines. The old naturalism and survival of classical freedom of drawing is replaced by stiff, conventionally hieratic types, very superior in dignity and strength to the feeble and spiritless compositions produced by the extreme degradation into which the native art of Rome had fallen. The designs of this second period of Christian art are very similar to those of the mosaics, such as many at Ravenna, and also to the magnificently illuminated MSS. on which the utmost skill and labour of the time were lavished. For some centuries there was but little change or development in this Byzantine style of art, so that it is impossible in most cases to be sure from mere internal evidence of the date of any painting. This to some extent applies also to the works of the earlier or pagan school, though, roughly speaking, it may be said that the least meritorious pictures are the latest in date.

These catacomb paintings range over a long space of time j some may possibly be of the 1st or 2d century, e.y., those in the cemetery of Domitilla, Rome; others are as late as the 9th century, e.y., some full-length figures of St Cornelius and St Cyprian in the catacomb of St Callixtus, under which earlier paintings may be traced. In execution they somewhat resemble the Etruscan tombpaintings; the walls of the catacomb passages and chambers, excavated in soft tufa, are covered with a thin skin of white stucco, and on that the mural and ceiling paintings are simply executed in earth colours. The favourite subjects of the earliest paintings are scenes from the Old Testament which were supposed to typify events in the life of Christ, such as the sacrifice of Isaac (Christ’s death), Jonah and the whale (the resurrection), Moses striking the rock, or pointing to the manna (Christ the water of life, and the Eucharist), and many others. The later paintings deal more with later subjects, either events in Christ’s life or figures of saints and - the miracles they performed. A very fine series of these exists in the lower church of S. Clemente in Rome, apparently dating from the 6th to the 10th centuries; among these are representations of the passion and death of Christ—subjects never chosen by the earlier Christians, except as dimly foreshadowed by the Old Testament types. When Christ Himself is depicted in the early catacomb paintings it is in glory and power, not in His human weakness and suffering.

Other early Italian paintings exist on the walls of the church of the Tre Fontane near Rome, and in the Capella di S. Urbano alia Caffarella, executed in the early part of the 11th century. The atrium of S. Lorenzo fuori le mura, Rome, and the church of the Quattro Santi Incoronati have mural paintings of the first half of the 13th century, which show no artistic improvement over those at S. Clemente four or five centuries older.

It was not in fact till the second half of the 13th century that stiff traditional Byzantine forms and colouring began to be superseded by the revival of native art in Italy by the painters of Florence, Pisa, and Siena (see Fresco). During the first thirteen centuries of the Christian era mural painting appears to have been for the most part confined to the representation of sacred subjects. It is remarkable that during the earlier centuries council after council of the Christian church forbade the painting of figure-subjects, and especially those of any Person of the Trinity; but it was quite in vain. The double desire, both for the artistic effect of painted walls and for the religious teaching afforded by the pictorial representation of sacred scenes and the celebration of the sacraments, was too strong. In spite of the zeal of bishops and others, who sometimes with their own hands defaced the pictures of Christ on the walls of the churches, in spite of threats of excommunication, the forbidden paintings by degrees became more numerous, till the walls of almost every church throughout Christendom were decorated with whole series of pictured stories. The useless prohibition was becoming obsolete when, towards the end of the 4th century, the learned Paulinus, bishop of Nola, ordered the two basilicas which he had built at Fondi and Nola to be adorned with wall-paintings of sacred subjects, with the special object, as he says, of instructing and refining the ignorant and drunken people. These painted histories were in fact the books of the unlearned, and we can now hardly realize their value and importance as the chief mode of religious teaching in ages when none but the clergy could read or write. English Mural Painting.— During the Middle Ages, just as long before among the ancient Greeks, coloured decoration was used in the widest possible manner, not only for the adornment of fiat walls, but also for the enrichment of sculpture and all the fittings and architectural features of buildings, whether the material to be painted was plaster, stone, marble, or wood. It was only the damp and frosts of northern climates that to some extent limited the external use of colour to the less exposed parts of the outsides of buildings. The varying tints and texture of smoothly-worked stone appear to have given no pleasure to the mediaeval eye; and in the rare cases in which the poverty of some country church prevented its walls from being adorned with painted ornaments or pictures the whole surface of the stone-work inside, mouldings and carving as well as flat wall-spaces, was covered with a thin coat of whitewash. Internal rough stonework was invariably concealed by stucco, forming a smooth ground for possible future paintings. Unhappily the ignorant barbarity of the 19th century has in the case of most English cathedrals and parish churches stripped off the internal plaster, often laying bare rubble walls of the roughest description, never meant to be exposed, and has scraped and rubbed the surface of the masonry and mouldings down to the bare stone. In this way a great proportion of mural paintings have been destroyed, though many in a more or less mutilated state still exist in England. It is difficult (and doubly so since the so-called “restoration” of most old buildings) to realize the splendour of effect once possessed by every important mediaeval church. From the tiled floor to the roof all was one mass of gold and colour. The brilliance of the mural paintings and richly-coloured sculpture and mouldings was in harmony with the splendour of the oak-work—screens, stalls, and roofs— all richly decorated with gilding and painting, while the light, passing through stained glass, softened and helped to combine the whole into one even mass of extreme decorative effect. Colour, and not in dull tints, was boldly applied everywhere, and thus the patchy effect was avoided which is so often the result of the modern timid and partial use of painted ornament. Even the figure-sculpture was painted in a strong and realistic manner, sometimes by a wax encaustic process, probably the same as the circumlitio of classical times. In the accounts for expenses in decorating Orvieto cathedral wax is a frequent item among the materials used for painting. In one place it is specially mentioned that wax was supplied to Andrea Pisano (in 1345) for the decoration of the beautiful reliefs in white marble on the lower part of the west front.

General Schemes of Mural Painting.— From the 11th to the 16th century the lower part of the walls, generally 6 to 8 feet from the floor, was painted with a dado—the favourite patterns till the 13th century being either a sort of sham masonry with a flower in each rectangular space (fig. 10), or a conventional, representation of a curtain with regular folds stiffly treated (Plate I.).

Above this dado ranges of pictures with figure-subjects were painted in tiers one above the other, each picture frequently surrounded by a painted frame with arch and gable of architectural design. Painted bands of chevron or other geometrical ornament till the 13th century, and flowing ornament afterwards, usually divide the tiers of pictures horizontally and form the top and bottom boundaries of the dado. In the case of a church, the end walls usually have figures to a larger scale. On the east wall of the nave over the chancel arch there was generally a large painting of the “Doom” or Last Judgment. One of the commonest subjects is a colossal figure of St Christopher (fig. 11), usually on the nave wall opposite the principal entrance,—selected because the sight of a picture of this saint was supposed to bring good luck for the rest of the day. Figures were also often painted on the jambs of the windows and on the piers and soffit of the arches, especially that opening into the chancel.

The little Norman church at Kempley in Gloucestershire (date about 1100) has perhaps the best-preserved specimen of the complete early decoration of a chancel. The north and south walls are occupied by figures of the twelve apostles in architectural niches, six on each side. The east wall had single figures of saints at the sides of the central window, and the stone barrel vault is covered with a representation of St John’s apocalyptic vision— Christ in majesty surrounded by the evangelistic beasts, the seven candlesticks, and other figures. The chancel arch itself and the jambs and mouldings of the windows have stiff geometrical designs, and over the arch, towards the nave, is a large picture of the “Doom.” The whole scheme is very complete, no part of the internal plaster or stone-work being undecorated with colour. Though the drawing is rude, the figures and their drapery are treated broadly and with dignity. Simple earth colours are used, painted in tempera on a plain white ground, which covers alike both the plaster of the rough walls and the smooth stone of the arches and jambs.

In the 13th century the painters of England reached a very high point of artistic power and technical skill, so much so that at that time paintings were produced by native artists quite equal, if not superior, to those of the same period anywhere on the Continent, not excepting even Italy. The central paintings on the walls of the chapter-house and on the retable of the high altar of Westminster Abbey are not surpassed by any of the smaller works even of such men as Cimabue and Duccio di Buoninsegna, who were living when these Westminster paintings were executed. Unhappily, partly through the poverty and anarchy brought about by the French wars and the Wars of the Roses, the development of art in England made but little progress after the beginning of the 14th century, and it was not till a time when the renaissance of art in Italy had fallen into a state of degradation and decay that its influence reached the British shores. In the 15th century some very beautiful and noble work, somewhat affected by Flemish influence, was produced in England (fig. 12), chiefly in the form of figures painted on the oak panels of chancel and chapel screens, especially in Norfolk and Suffolk; but, fine as many of these are, they cannot be said to rival in any sense the works of the Van Eycks and other painters of that time in Flanders. To return to the 13th century, the culminating period of English art in painting and sculpture, much was owed to Henry III.’s love for and patronage of the fine arts; he employed a large number of painters to decorate his various castles and palaces, especially the palace of Westminster, one large hall of which was known as the “painted chamber” from the rows of fine pictures with which its walls were covered. After the 13th century the “masonry pattern” was disused for the lower parts of walls, and the chevrony and other stiff patterns for the borders were replaced by more flowing designs (Plate I.). The character of the painted figures became less monumental in style; greater freedom of drawing and treatment was adopted, and they cease in any way to recall the archaic majesty and grandeur of the Byzantine mosaics. A detailed description of the development of the successive styles of mural painting would be almost a complete history of English art, which space does not allow here, but it may be noted that during the 14th century wall-spaces unoccupied by figure-subjects were often covered by graceful flowing patterns, drawn with great freedom of hand and rather avoiding geometrical repetition. Fig. 13, from the church of Stanley St Leonard’s, Gloucestershire, is a good characteristic specimen of 14th-century decoration; it is on the walls of the chancel, filling up the spaces between the painted figures; the flowers are blue, and the lines red on a white ground. In some cases the motive of the design is taken from encaustic tiles, as at Bengeo Church, Herts, where the wall is divided into squares, each containing an heraldic lion. This imitative notion occurs during all periods—masonry, hanging curtains, tiles, and architectural features such as niches and canopies being very frequently represented, though always in a simple decorative fashion with no attempt at actual deception,—not probably from any fixed principle that shams were wrong, but because the good taste of the mediaeval painters taught them that a flat unrealistic treatment gave the best and most decorative effect. Thus in the 15th and 16th centuries the commonest forms of un pictorial wall-decoration were various patterns taken from the beautiful damasks and cut velvets of Sicily, Florence, Genoa, and other places in Italy, some form of the “pine-apple” or rather “artichoke” pattern being the favourite (fig. 14), a design which, developed partly from Oriental sources, and coming to perfection at the end of the 15th century, was copied and reproduced in textiles, printed stuffs, and wall-papers with but little change down to the present century,—a remarkable instance of survival in design. Fig. 15 is a specimen of 15th-century English decorative painting, copied from a 14th-century Sicilian silk damask. Diapers, powderings with flowers, sacred monograms, and sprays of blossom were frequently used to ornament large surfaces in a simple way. Many of these are extremely beautiful (fig. 16).

Subjects qf Mediaeval Wall-Paintings.- In churches and domestic buildings alike the usual subjects represented on the walls were specially selected for their moral and religious teaching, either stories from the Bible and Apocrypha, or from the lives of saints, or, lastly, symbolical representations setting forth some important theological truth, such as figures of Virtues and Vices, or the Scala Humanae Salvationis, showing the perils and temptations of the human soul in its struggle to escape hell and gain paradise—a rude foreshadowing of the great scheme worked out with such perfection by Dante in his Commedia. A fine example of this subject exists on the walls of Chaldon Church, Surrey. In the selection of saints for paintings in England, those of English origin are naturally most frequently represented, and different districts had certain local favourites.

St Thomas of Canterbury was one of the most widely popular; but few examples now remain, owing to Henry VIII.’s special dislike to this saint and the strict orders that were issued for all pictures of him to be destroyed. For a similar reason most paintings of saintly popes were obliterated.

Methods of Execution. — Though Eraclius, who probably wrote before the 10th century, mentions the use of an oil-medium, yet till about the 13th century mural paintings appear to have been executed in the most simple way, in tempera mainly with earth colours applied on dry stucco; even when a smooth stone surfa< e was to be painted a thin coat of whitening or fine gesso was laid as a ground. No instance of true fresco has been discovered in England. In the 13th century, and perhaps earlier, oil was commonly used both as a medium for the pigments and also to make a varnish to cover and fix tempera paintings. Vasari’s statement as to the discovery of the use of oil-medium by the Van Eycks is certainly untrue, but it probably has a germ of truth. The Van Eycks introduced the use of dryers of a better kind than had yet been used, and so largely extended the application of oil-painting. Before their time it seems to have been the custom to dry wall-paintings laboriously by the use of charcoal braziers, if they were in a position where the sun could not shine upon them. This is specially recorded in the valuable series of accounts for the expenses of wall-paintings in the royal palace of Westminster during the reign of Henry III., printed in Vetusta Monumenta, vol. vi., 1842. All the materials used, including charcoal to dry the paintings and the wages paid to the artists, are given. The materials mentioned are jdumbum album et rubeum, viridus, vermilio, synople, ocre, azura, aurum, argentum, collis, oleum, remix.

Two foreign painters were employed—Peter of Spain and William of Florence—at sixpence a day, but the English painters seem to have done most of the work and received higher pay. William, an English monk in the adjoining Benedictine abbey of Westminster, received two shillings a day. Walter of Durham and various members of the Otho family, royal goldsmiths and moneyers, worked for many years on the adornment of Henry III.’s palace and were well paid for their skill. Some fragments of paintings from the royal chapel of St Stephen are now in the British Museum. They are very delicate and carefully-painted subjects from the Old Testament, in rich colours, each with explanatory inscription underneath. The scale is small, the figures being scarcely a foot high. Their method of execution is curious. First the smooth stone wall was covered with a coat of red, painted in oil, probably to keep back the damp; on that a thin skin of fine gesso (stucco) has been applied, and the outlines of the figures marked with a point; the whole of the background, crowns, borders of dresses, and other ornamental parts have then been modelled and stamped with very minute patterns in slight relief, impressed on the surface of the gesso while it was yet soft. The figures have then been painted, apparently in tempera, gold leaf has been applied to the stamped reliefs, and the whole has been covered with an oil varnish. It is difficult to realize the amount of patience and labour required to cover large halls such as the above chapel and the “painted chamber,” the latter about 83 feet by 27, with this minute and gorgeous style of decoration.

In many cases the grounds were entirely covered with shining metal leaf, over which the paintings were executed; those parts, such as the draperies, where the metallic lustre was wanted, were painted in oil with transparent colours, while the flesh was painted in opaque tempera. The effect of the bright metal shining through the rich colouring is very magnificent. This extreme minuteness of much of the mediaeval wall - decoration is very remarkable. Large wall-surfaces and intricate mouldings were often completely covered by elaborate gesso patterns in relief of almost microscopic delicacy (fig. 17). The cost öf stamps for this is among the items in the Westminster accounts. These patterns when set and dry were further adorned with gold and colours in the most laborious way. So also with the architectural painting; the artist was not content simply to pick out the various members of the mouldings in different colours, but he also frequently covered each bead or fillet with painted flowers and other patterns, as delicate as those in an illuminated MS.,—so minute and highly-finished that they are almost invisible at a little distance, but yet add greatly to the general richness of effect. All this is completely neglected in modern reproductions of mediaeval painting, in which both touch and colour are alike coarse and harsh—mere caricatures of the old work, such as unhappily disfigure the Sainte Chapelle in Paris, and many cathedrals in France, Germany, and England. Gold was never used in large quantities without the ground on which it was laid being broken up by some such delicate reliefs as that shown in fig. 17, so its effect was never gaudy or dazzling.

Mural painting in England fell into disuse in the 16 th century. For domestic purposes wood panelling, stamped leather, and tapestry were chiefly used as wall-coverings. In the reign of Henry VIII., probably in part through Holbein’s influence, a rather coarse sort of tempera wall-painting, German in style, appears to have been common.

A good example of arabesque painting of this period in black and white, rudely though boldly drawn and very Holbeinesque in character, was discovered in 1881 behind the panelling in one of the canons’ houses at Westminster. Other examples exist at Haddon Hall (Derbyshire) and elsewhere.

Several attempts have been made in the present century to revive the art of monumental wall-decoration, but mostly, like those in the new Houses of Parliament, unsuccessful both in method and design. A large wall-painting by Sir Frederick Leighton of the Arts of War, on a wall in the South Kensington Museum, is much disfigured by the disagreeable gravelly surface of the stucco. The process employed is that invented by Mr Gambier Parry, and called by him “spirit fresco.” A very fine series of mural paintings has been executed by Mr Madox Brown on the walls of the Manchester town-hall. These also are painted in Mr Parry’s “spirit fresco,” but on a smooth stucco surface, free from the unpleasant granular appearance of the South Kensington picture.

The Mediaeval Wall-Paintings of the Continent.— In the main the above remarks on English mural decoration apply equally to that of France, Germany, and Scandinavia. Though each of these countries had certain peculiarities of style, mostly slight and unimportant, yet in method of execution, choice and arrangement of subjects, and division of the wall-spaces there is a very close similarity between them all. Italy, on the other hand, developed a style of her own, more purely pictorial, with less regard to the exigencies of architecture. In northern lands the mural paintings were strictly subordinate to the main features of the structure for which they were designed, while in Italy as a rule the architect did but little to decorate the interior of his buildings, and left the painter free to treat the walls as he pleased.

The very close similarity of the mural decoration in the churches of Sweden to those of England is very remarkable, and some of the Swedish churches have very magnificent and well-preserved schemes of decoration, covering walls and ceilings alike, of dates varying from the 13th to the 15th centuries, all of which have little or nothing to distinguish them from contemporary work in England. Man-delgren’s Monuments Scandinaves (1862) has well-executed reproductions of some of the best of these, especially the fine and complete specimens in the churches of Bjeresjoe, Ameneharads Räda, Risingë, and Floda. One of these, the north chancel wall of the church of Räda, 13th century, has been selected (Plate I.) as a good and characteristic example of the treatment of a large wall-space in the 14th century; the dado of painted curtain-folds, the tiers of single life-size figures in architectural niches treated with great breadth and decorative skill, and the band below of subjects on a rather smaller scale give a good idea of a common scheme of ecclesiastic decoration. An inscription on one of these paintings gives the date of their execution as 1323. The lower subject represents the death of the Virgin, above are figures of the apostles, and highest of all, painted on the curved boarding of the waggon-vault, are a row of seated prophets under round arches. The other examples on the same plate, given as specimens of 15th-century flowing patterns, are from the church of Kumbla, also in Sweden, and fully illustrated in Mandel-gren’s valuable work.

Oriental Painting. — In the churches and monasteries of the Greeks mural painting is still practised very much as it was in the 12th or 13th centuries. Neither colouring, nor drawing, nor method has in the least altered during the last six hundred years. Everything is fixed by certain unchangeable hieratic rules, and the Greek painter-monk would think it impious to improve upon or deviate from the artistic canons for sacred subjects handed down from century to century. For this reason it is generally impossible, from internal evidence, to guess the date of the interesting wall-paintings with which many churches in eastern Europe, Egypt, and Asia Minor are decorated.

In India and Ceylon mural painting has been largely used from very early times, especially to decorate the walls of temples. Some of these appear to be executed in true fresco. Birth-stories of Buddha and other sacred subjects most frequently occur. As among the mediaeval and modern Greeks, the strong conservatism of the Hindu races makes it difficult to judge as to the dates of these paintings. (w. mo. —J. h. μ.)