St Peter's

[poliphilo]

St Peter's is an ugly building too. It has no poetry about it, no charm. What it's saying is, "This is the Pope's house and the Pope has loads of money." I'm coming to the slightly surprising conclusion that I don't much like marble- certainly not as a building material; it's too shiny; it has the arrogance to defy time. I prefer stone that weathers and crumbles and provides safe footing for lichen. Caen stone, that's the stuff!

I don't envy the Romans their buildings- well, maybe the Pantheon and some of those tombs along the Appian Way- but they can keep St Peter's and most of what's in it. I'd far rather have an English or French medieval cathedral- even a very small one- like Rochester.

Comments

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

And who am I to argue with that as a native of Rochester? :o)

The Caen stone still makes a home for a species of wallflower found nowhere else in the UK.

And I still think the west door is one of the finest I've seen anywhere, even in France, so there! :o)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

The West door is lovely.