Volltext Seite (XML)
Chap. II. SICULO-NORMAN ART. 75 ful head accused the progress of materialism in art. Yet the habit of nailing the feet separately to the cross had not been abandoned, and as a study of muscular anatomy, the figure was not imperfect as it afterwards became. In the corner of the left transept, above a marble throne, the Saviour was depicted imposing the crown on the head of William the Second. This and a solitary figure of S. John, removed from the old baptistery near the right transept, to a niche in the right aisle, were amongst the most careful and best mosaics in the edifice. In general, however, the forms and features of the apostles and saints were no longer equal to those of Cefalu, and a certain stiffness or contortion of attitudes might be noticed; the eyes had become more open and gazing, the draperies more straight and angular. Nor were the harmonies of colour preserved in their purity; and greyish red shadows with lines of a broader and more cutting character marked the decline of art in Sicily. Ere long, and hardly a cen tury later, the mosaists produced examples at Messina which were not superior to those of the eleventh century at Capua. 1 On the Italian continent, as for instance at Salerno the influence of the Sicilian mosaists was felt. But the mo saics of the Cathedral 2 are so damaged that they defy all criticism. A solitary half figure of S. Mathew, in a door lunette, is however not without character, and makes 1 These examples adorned the 3 | apsides of the cathedral of Messi na. In the central one, less de fective than the two others, yet much damaged, Eleanor, wife of Frederic of Aragon, and Elizabeth, Queen of Peter of Aragon, were represented kneeling at each side of a throne on which the Saviour and the Virgin sat together guarded by angels and female saints. The apsis to the right was devoted to king Louis of Anjou and John, Duke of Athens, placed on each side of S. John the Baptist and supported by saints. The apsis I to the left, was honoured with the kneeling figures of king Fre deric and king Peter with Guido, Bishop of Messina, saints and angels, all beneath a very defec tive figure of the Saviour in glory. The first of these apsis mosaics was remarkable for long dra peries of intricate fold, for ill drawn figures, yet less defective than those in the semidomes at the sides, where disproportion of form and rudeness of design were combined. 2 This cathedral was founded by Robert Guiscard in 1084.