inhabitants and the conditions under which they grew in culture. In some
cases we may refer this local character to nationality and geographical
position. Thus the name of the Lombards has been given to a style of
Romanesque, which prevailed through Northern and Central Italy during the
period of Lombard ascendency.[10] The Tuscans never forgot the domes of
their remote ancestors; the Romans adhered closely to Latin traditions;
the Southerners were affected by Byzantine and Saracenic models. In many
instances the geology of the neighbourhood determined the picturesque
features of its architecture. The clay-fields of the valley of the Po
produced the brickwork of Cremona, Pavia, Crema, Chiaravalle, and
Vercelli. To their quarries of _mandorlato_ the Veronese builders owed the
peach-bloom colours of their columned aisles. Carrara provided the Pisans
with mellow marble for their Baptistery and Cathedral; Monte Ferrato
supplied Pistoja and Prato with green serpentine; while the _pietra
serena_ of the Apennines added austerity to the interior of Florentine
buildings. Again, in other instances, we detect the influence of commerce
or of conquest. The intercourse of Venice with Alexandria determined the
unique architecture of S. Mark's. The Arabs and the Normans left
ineffaceable traces of their sojourn on Palermo. Naples and Messina still
bear marks upon their churches of French workmen. All along the coasts we
here and there find evidences of Oriental style imported into mediaeval
Italy, while the impress of the Spaniard is no less manifest in edifices
of a later period.

Existing thus in the midst of many potent influences, and surrounded by
the ruins of past civilisations, the Italians recombined and mingled
styles of marked variety. The Roman, Byzantine, Saracenic, Lombard, and
German traditions were blended in their architecture, as the presiding
genius of each place determined. It followed that master-works of rare and
subtle invention were produced, while no one type was fully perfected, nor