The illustrations of the two chairs of German Gothic furniture formerly in
some of the old castles, are good examples of their time, and are from
drawings made on the spot by Prof. Heideloff.


[Illustration: Two German Chairs (Late 15th Century). (_From Drawings made
in Old German Castles by Prof. Heideloff._)]



There are in our South Kensington Museum some full-sized plaster casts of
important specimens of woodwork of the fifteenth and two previous
centuries, and being of authenticated dates, we can compare them with the
work of the same countries after the Renaissance had been adopted and had
completely altered design. Thus in Italy there was, until the latter part
of the fifteenth century, a mixture of Byzantine and Gothic of which we
can see a capital example in the casts of the celebrated Pulpit in the
Baptistry of Pisa, the date of which is 1260. The pillars are supported by
lions, which, instead of being introduced heraldically into the design, as
would be the case some two hundred years later, are bearing the whole
weight of the pillars and an enormous superstructure on the hollow of
their backs in a most impossible manner. The spandril of each arch is
filled with a saint in a grotesque position amongst Gothic foliage, and
there is in many respects a marked contrast to the casts of examples of
the Renaissance period which are in the Museum.

[Illustration: Carved Oak Buffet in Gothic Style (Viollet le Duc).
Period: XV. Century. French.]

This transition from Mediaeval and Gothic, to Renaissance, is clearly