nsideration of the debasement of
the Greek types which took place when their cycle of achievement had
been fulfilled, pass to the germination of Christian architecture, out
of one of the least important elements of those fallen forms--one which,
less than the least of all seeds, has risen into the fair branching
stature under whose shadow we still dwell.

The principal characteristics of the new architecture, as exhibited in
the Lombard cathedral, are well sketched by Lord Lindsay:--

* * *

"The three most prominent features, the eastern aspect of the sanctuary,
the cruciform plan, and the soaring octagonal cupola, are borrowed from
Byzantium--the latter in an improved form--the cross with a
difference--the nave, or arm opposite the sanctuary, being lengthened so
as to resemble the supposed shape of the actual instrument of suffering,
and form what is now distinctively called the Latin Cross. The crypt and
absis, or tribune, are retained from the Romish basilica, but the absis
is generally pierced with windows, and the crypt is much loftier and
more spacious, assuming almost the appearance of a subterranean church.
The columns of the nave, no longer isolated, are clustered so as to form
compound piers, massive and heavy--their capitals either a rude
imitation of the Corinthian, or, especially in the earlier structures,
sculptured with grotesque imagery. Triforia, or galleries for women,
frequently line the nave and transepts. The roof is of stone, and
vaulted. The narthex, or portico, for excluded penitents, common alike
to the Greek and Roman churches, and in them continued along the whole
facade of entrance, is dispensed with altogether in the oldest Lombard
ones, and when afterwards resumed, in the eleventh century, was
restricted to what we should now call Porches, over each door,
consisting generally of little more than a canopy open at the sides, and
supported by slender pillars, resting on sculptured monsters. Three
doors admit from the western front; these are generally covered with
sculpture, which frequently extends in belts across the facade, and even
along the sides of the building. Above the central door is usually seen,
in the later Lombard churches, a S. Catherine's-wheel window. The roof
slants at the sides, and ends in front sometimes in a single pediment,
sometimes in three gables answering to three doors; while, in Lombardy
at least, hundreds of slender pillars, of every form and