orinthian volute, and are now pure and plain leaves, such as were
used in the Lombardic Gothic of the early thirteenth century all over
Italy. Now in a round-arched gateway at Verona, certainly not later than
1300; the pointed leaves of this pure form are used in one portion of
the mouldings, and in another are enriched by having their surfaces
carved each into a beautiful ribbed and pointed leaf. The capital, fig.
6, Plate II., is nothing more than fig. 13 so enriched; and the two
conditions are quite contemporary, fig. 13 being from a beautiful series
of fourth order windows in Campo Sta. M^a. Mater Domini, already drawn
in my folio work.

Fig. 13 is representative of the richest conditions of Gothic capital
which existed at the close of the thirteenth century. The builder of the
Ducal Palace amplified them into the form of fig. 9, but varying the
leafage in disposition and division of lobes in every capital; and the
workmen trained under him executed many noble capitals for the Gothic
palaces of the early fourteenth century, of which fig. 12, from a palace
in the Campo St. Polo, is one of the most beautiful examples. In figs. 9
and 12 the reader sees the Venetian Gothic capital in its noblest
developement. The next step was to such forms as fig. 15, which is
generally characteristic of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth
century Gothic, and of which I hope the reader will at once perceive the
exaggeration and corruption.

This capital is from a palace near the Miracoli, and it is remarkable
for the delicate, though corrupt, ornament on its abacus, which is
precisely the same as that on the pillars of the screen of St. Mark's.
That screen is a monument of very great value, for it shows the entire
corruption of the Gothic power, and the style of the later palaces
accurately and completely defined in all its parts, and is dated 1380;
thus at once furnishing us with a limiting date, which throws all the
noble work of the early Ducal Palace, and all that is like it in Venice,
thoroughly back into the middle of the fourteenth century at the latest.

Fig. 2 is the simplest condition of the capital universally employed in
the windows of the second order, noticed above, Vol. II., as belonging
to a style of great importance in the transitional architecture of
Venice. Observe, that in all the capitals given in the lateral columns
in Plate II., the points of the leaves _turn over_. But in this central
group they lie _flat_