ADVERTISEMENT TO THE PRESENT EDITION. THE Chronological Table which forms the principal part of this volume has been carefully revised throughout, the references verified, and cotemporary authorities quoted wherever it was practicable to do so; in other cases when modern works are referred to, they are such as can be relied on, and the original authorities will generally be found there cited. A considerable number of foreign examples have also been added for the sake of comparison, which will be found highly interesting, as shewing the progress which the changes of style had made in different countries at the same time. For these improvements the work is principally indebted to the Count Mortara, who has spared no pains in examining a large number of the works of the chroniclers, and other cotemporary authors, and extracting such passages as suited the purpose. For the notices of the style of the different buildings where no authority is quoted, the publisher is responsible, these notices being generally taken from observations written on the spot while the object was before him, as he has found that memory is not always to be trusted in these details even for a short period. The value of the work will it is hoped be enhanced by the series of Inscriptions recording the dates of buildings, which have been carefully reduced from tracings or rubbings wherever they could be obtained, so as to preserve the form of the letters with the greatest accuracy; others have been taken from Pegge's Sylloge, and a few from other authentic sources. Specimens of mouldings and other characteristic ornaments have been occasionally added from buildings of which the date was ascertained, for the sake of reference and comparison, and to shew that the system adopted in this work is not one of theory or conjecture, but grounded on ascertained facts. A few discrepancies may be observed between the dates ascribed to particular specimens in the plates, and the more exact Except the first twenty pages, which were partly prepared by Thomas Wright, |