The Gradual Change from the Early English Style to the Decorated
The change from the Early English to the Decorated style was so very gradual, that it is impossible to draw any line where one style ceases and the other begins. The time of Edward I. was that of the change, and some of our most beautiful examples belong to that period.
In the early Decorated the sculpture of the human figure is remarkable for the ease and chasteness of the attitudes, and the free and graceful, though at the same time rich, folds of the drapery. Few figures can surpass in simplicity and beauty the effigy of Queen Eleanor in Westminster Abbey, and those on the crosses erected to her memory are almost equally fine, especially those on the Northampton cross; those at Waltham have been mutilated and restored. They were all executed between 1291 and 1294, as appears by the builders’ accounts, which are still extant. The cross at Geddington is perhaps the most perfect of those which remain. This is not mentioned in the executors’ accounts, but probably only because that part of the accounts has been lost; it is as plainly a memorial cross to Queen Eleanor as either of the others.
The three arches of the sedilia and the small one of the piscina at Harleston, Northants, may also be considered as transitional; the trefoil arch used under the pointed one, if taken by itself, would be Early English, and the moldings are deeply undercut, which is another mark of that style. On the other hand, the form of the moldings is that of a roll of parchment, and this form is more usually of the Decorated style.
The transepts of Westminster Abbey are recorded to have been built in his time, and they contain some of the most beautiful work that can be found anywhere; the capital next, with its natural foliage standing out quite free on the bell of the capital, would be considered as belonging to the Decorated style; but the deep undercutting of the abacus would rather belong to the Early English, and the roll-molding may be either Early English or Decorated. Some of the capitals are molded only, without foliage, and some of these have the abacus octagonal, which is more usual in French than in English work.
Some have proposed to divide the Decorated style into two—the geometrical and the flowing; but here the distinction is not sufficiently broad to constitute two distinct styles, although, as sub-divisions, these terms were used by Rickman himself, and are useful. But these two divisions are so frequently contemporaneous, and run into each other so continually, that it is almost impossible to separate them in practice: the windows may indeed be distinguished, though even in these we often find windows with geometrical tracery and others with flowing tracery in the same building, with the same moldings and details; and no distinction can be drawn in doorways and buttresses. It is better, therefore, to continue to use the received divisions of styles, and the received names for them. There is no broad line of distinction and of division in medieval buildings, it was one continual progress or decline; the divisions are arbitrary, but very convenient in practice.
The beautiful crosses erected by Edward I. at all the places where the body of Queen Eleanor had rested on its way from Grantham, Lincolnshire, where she died, to Westminster Abbey, where she was buried, all belong to this time of change, but are usually reckoned as early examples of the Decorated style. The accounts for preserving these are for the most part among the Public Records, but Geddington is not included, probably only because that account had been lost or mislaid in the Record Office, which was long much neglected; so much so, that for many years the valuable records were kept in the stables of Carlton House, the residence of the Prince Regent, afterwards George IV.