Our Book Causerie.
Art in the Middle Ages.

“Art and the Reformation,” by G. G. Coulton, M.A., Hon. D.Litt. (Blackwell, Oxford). Having read several of “G.G's.” earlier works, dearly as we love a little argufying, we hesitated taking up this his latest volume. We are glad now we overcame our reluctance, for though the subject is one that we had concluded would prove to Mr. Coulton like a red rag to a bull, we find ourselves agreeably mistaken. For once Mr. Coulton eschews hypercriticism, and gets on with his story. Still, as is his wont, he holds to his own opinion about most things, but this he is content to state, sometimes to state emphatically, and pass on to other, for the time being, more interesting matters. Between the boards of this massive volume is gathered and arranged in easily accessible form much valuable information concerning the arts and crafts of the Middle Ages. Every chapter is worth its place, but the chapter headed “Four Self-Characterisations” is not only one of the best in the book, but, so far as we know, one of the best ever written on the subject. The four artists dealt with therein are the Italian, Cennino Cennini; the South German, Durer; the Master-Mason, Villard de Honnecourt; and the North German Monk, who has been identified as Roger of Helsmerhausen, Another excellent chapter is that dealing with the Freemasons. Mr. Coulton therein gives as his opinion that the word originally meant “workers in freestone,” thus differing from the late Dr. Cunningham and Mr. Kingsley Porter, who, respectively, explain the word as meaning “the freedom of the town,” and “free from any fee on entering the trade.” Throughout the volume there are many quaint touches of quiet humour. We are told that when Henry de Bruxelles (architect and mason of the pulpitum which divided the nave from choir in Troyes Cathedral) married, in 1384:

The Canons docked him of a day's pay, though they made up for this by a wedding present of twelve loaves and eight pints of wine, which would come to very much the same cost.

He quotes Cennini as saying that he found that his profession enticed youthful ladies, “especially those of Tuscany, to ask for face paints and complexion waters.” This provides a peg on which to hang the following story:-

Oreagna, Taddeo Gaddi, and other painters, having eaten well and filled themselves with wine at the table of the Abbot of San Miniato, discussed who was the greatest painter from Giotto onwards. When all had spoken, the sculptor Alberto Arnoldi gave his opinion: No other painter is comparable with the ladies of Florence, who habitually improve upon the Almighty's own handiwork. Are we to believe that God never created a dark Florentine? Yet who knows a lady whose face is not white? The prize was unanimously adjudged to Alberto. But even in the Middle Ages, if we are to believe the preachers, these works of complexional art betrayed a painful lack of durability.

Despite Mr. Coulton's penchant for arguebargue, there is little trace of this throughout the volume. Still the language is often vigorous and vital, while the narrative is rich in humour and humanity. The volume is fully and excellently illustrated, many of the pictures being very fine. Like most other volumes from the same pen, the end of the story is not the end of the book! The “Appendices” reach the respectable total of all but three dozen!