of political existence that made her what she was? Yet, standing before
some of the great Lombard churches, we are inclined to speculate, perhaps
with better reason, what the result would have been if that style of
architecture could have assumed the complete ascendency over the Italians
which the Romanesque and Gothic of the North exerted over France and
England?[12] The pyramidal façade common in these buildings, the campanili
that suspend aërial lanterns upon plain square towers, the domes rising
tier over tier from the intersection of nave and transept to end in
minarets and pinnacles, the low long colonnades of marble pilasters, the
open porches resting upon lions, the harmonious blending of baked clay and
rosy-tinted stone, the bold combination of round and pointed arches, and
the weird invention whereby every string-course and capital has been
carved with lions, sphinxes, serpents, mermaids, griffins, harpies, winged
horses, lizards, and knights in armour--all these are elements that might,
we fancy, have been developed into a noble national style. As it is, the
churches in question are often more bizarre than really beautiful. Their
peculiar character, however, is inseparably associated with the long
reaches of green plain, the lordly rivers, and the background of blue
hills and snowy Alps that constitute the charm of Lombard landscape.

If Lombard architecture, properly so-called, was partial in its influence
and confined to a comparatively narrow local sphere, the same is true of
the Tuscan Romanesque. The church of Samminiato, near Florence [about
1013], and the cathedral of Pisa [begun 1063], not to mention other less
eminent examples at Lucca and Pistoja, are sufficient evidences that in
the darkest period of the Middle Ages the Italians were aiming at an
architectural Renaissance. The influence of classical models is apparent
both in the construction and the detail of these basilicas; while the
deeply grounded preference of the Italian genius for round arches, for
colonnades of pillars and pilasters, and for large rectangular spaces,