400 ITALLVX AECHITECTURE. Part II. alone, this churcli would have more properly been described under the head of Saracenic than of Christian architecture. There are three other churches at Palermo which exhibit the new mixed style in all its completeness. These are the Martorana (1113- 1139), in which the Greek element prevails somewhat to the exclusion of the other two; the Capella Palatina in the Palace, built in 1132; and the more magnificent church of Monreale, near Palermo (Wood- cut No. 831), begun in 1174, and certainly the finest and most beautiiul of all the buildings erected by the Normans in this country. This church is 315 ft. in its extreme length ; vhile the beautiful gem-like 830. San Giovanni degli Eremiti, Palermo. (From Gaily Knight's " Normans in Sicily.") Capella of the royal palace is much smaller, being only 125 ft. long, and consequently inferior in grandeur, though in the relative propor- tions of its ]iarts, and in all other essential points, very similar. In arrangement and dimensions the cathedral of Monreale very much resembles that at Messina, showing the same general influence in both ; but all the details of the Palermitau example betray that admixture of Greek and Saracenic feeling which is the peculiarity of Sicilian archi- tecture. There is scarcely a single form or detail in the whole building which can strictly be called Gothic, or which points to any connection with Northern arts or races. The plan of this, as of all the Sicilian
