History of mediæval art . ce of thosebraided patterns which played so prom-inent a part in the wood carving ofScandinavia, while in the representationof figures no progress is to be observedin this branch during the eleventh andtwelfth centuries. The truly admirablecrucifix with the figures of the Virginand St. John which surmounts the highaltar in Wechselburg is, therefore, themore remarkable. What has alreadybeen said of the stone sculptures inFreiberg is true of this wonderful pro-duction, which also betrays a depend-ence upon the early works of the FrenchGothic; and yet, withal, it is an a
History of mediæval art . ce of thosebraided patterns which played so prom-inent a part in the wood carving ofScandinavia, while in the representationof figures no progress is to be observedin this branch during the eleventh andtwelfth centuries. The truly admirablecrucifix with the figures of the Virginand St. John which surmounts the highaltar in Wechselburg is, therefore, themore remarkable. What has alreadybeen said of the stone sculptures inFreiberg is true of this wonderful pro-duction, which also betrays a depend-ence upon the early works of the FrenchGothic; and yet, withal, it is an anom-aly: so fine a feeling for beauty, suchunderstanding of form, in short, feat-ures of such excellence are, for the en-tire thirteenth century in Germany,enigmatical. The work is probably dependent upon the sculpturesat Freiberg, but so far surpasses these that it is doubtful whether itcan be ascribed to an earlier date than the end of the century inquestion. With exception of the last-named Saxon examples, sculpture in. Fig. 273. — Carving of Wood fromSt. Emmeramnus, Ratisbon. GERMANY. 449 stone and wood during the Romanic epoch was inferior to that inmetals. Casting in metal must have been handed down from thetime of Charlemagne. The fact that the Bishop of Verden, aboutthe year 990, gave six bronze columns to the Convent of Corveydoes not, indeed, prove this assumption, as these columns mighthave come to Verden from the foundery of Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle. Still, it is known with certainty that, a few years later,Abbot Deuthemar ordered six more columns, corresponding to thefirst, to be executed by the bronze founder Gottfried of Corvey,and that, in 1004, Abbot Hosad of Corvey had a monument cast inhonor of a learned monk Widukind of that convent. Existing re-mains prove that bronze casting was practised, during the followingdecades, in Mayence, Hildesheim, and Augsburg. Archbishop Willigis of Mayence, in the gates of the Cathedralcast in 1007 by Master Beringer,
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