The discovery of Romanesque art is related to the architect Philibert de l'Orme in the century who would have carried out some surveys[4]​ and to the historians of the and centuries. After the French Revolution, some Norman emigrants to England discovered some research—such as Anglo-Norman Antiquities published in 1767 and The Architectural Antiquities of Normands[5]​ by John Sell Cotman—and observed that English "antiquaries" called "Saxon" the architectural style that dominated in their country before its conquest by the Normans in 1066, and "Norman" style from the conquest until the end of the century. In France, scholars apply, for architectural works of this period, the names "normand"), "lombard"), "byzantin" sometimes preceded by the appellation "gothique" (in the initial pejorative sense of 'art of the Goths'), or the name of "gothique ancien". with his colleagues from the "Society of Antiquaries of Normandy" (founded in 1824)—Charles de Gerville (1769-1853), Auguste Le Prévost") and Arcisse de Caumont (1801-1873)—a "moving school of architectural specialists"[6]​ who wanted to reappropriate that Norman heritage.

The archaeologist and scholar Gerville, driven by the desire for unification and universal classification typical of the scholars of the 19th century, was looking for a common name. According to historiographic tradition,[7]​ in a letter of December 18, 1818 that he sent to Le Prévost, he had the happy idea of ​​using the term roman to designate[8]​ Western Christian architecture from the reign of Charlemagne until the end of the century or the beginning of the century. He justified the choice on the one hand by an analogy with the langues romanes (Romance languages, which at that time began to be used to designate those languages ​​that had broken off from Latin) and on the other to underline its supposed[9]​ affiliation with Roman architecture, erroneously establishing a relationship between the area of ​​diffusion of that architecture and that of the Romance languages.[10]​.

Caumont, father of medieval archaeology, resumed and promoted its use in 1824 since he saw that in that architecture of the first centuries of the Middle Ages all the characteristics of Roman architecture appeared in a state of advanced degeneration. or "Neo-Greek"[12]​ and Romanesque architecture quickly replaced the then common appellations of Lombard, Saxon or Anglo-Norman, and was considered a first attempt at the artistic unification of Europe. Authors such as Victor Hugo, Stendhal or Mérimée and other writers of the Romantic generation imposed it in common use after 1860 since they sought to rehabilitate the Middle Ages and saw in Romanesque art a "dégénération" of Roman art due to the degradation of traditions and the collapse of ancient civilization, and they differentiated secular Gothic art "Secular (Catholic Church)"), characterized by its vertical impulse, from monastic Romanesque art, in which horizontality prevailed, and whose buildings had affinities with ancient art that exalted the power of the Roman Emperors.[13]​

The terminological journey of the term "roman" in various European countries allows us to "confirm that the great diversity of the monumental landscape of the medieval West creates considerable epistemological gaps in the different regions, often characterized by a geographically limited vision and sometimes tinged with ideology." The terms romanisch, in Germany, Romanesque art, in Great Britain, arte romanesque, in Spain, arte romanica, in Italy, have been, as in France, "the object of various controversies in its own linguistic culture, before being definitively established in historiography."[14]​

The study of the new architectural period followed the evolution of archeology and its limits, and went from a romantic and intuitive history of art to an early establishment of typologies. At first, Caumont and his friends defined three phases in the Romanesque period from the Roman decadence: from the century century to the century; from the end of the to the end of the century; and the century, in which the pointed arch replaced the semicircular arch, a capital difference in the shape of the arcades, which, together with others, established the distinctive character between Romanesque and Gothic architecture. Jules Quicherat") rightly restricted its meaning to the buildings of the 15th centuries.

After having defined the limits in time, Caumont sought to define common characteristics in space and outlined, in French territory, seven monumental regions defined in particular by the nature of the soil but also by differences in taste and skill that could only come from the schools. Quicherat, Viollet-le-Duc, Anthyme Saint-Paul and Auguste Choisy took up and completed the idea. In 1925, François Deshoulières in the Bulletin Monumental[16]​ proposed nine schools: Île-de-France and Campagne, Normandy, Lombardy-Rhineland, Lower Loire, South-West and Poitou, Auvergne, Burgundy, Provence and Languedoc. After the studies of Caumont, who had dated Romanesque architecture from the century to the century, the concept of Late Antiquity was created, which would go from the century to the century, ascribing Carolingian architecture to the High Middle Ages and analyzing the "century of the year one thousand" in comparison with the preceding era and no longer as a harbinger of the future.

In 1935, a Catalan architect Puig i Cadafalch (1867-1956) defined a "first Romanesque art" carried out by different peoples that spread across a large part of Europe before private schools were developed.[17][18] Pierre Francastel in 1942 redefined regional schools, replacing the term "first Romanesque art" with the "first Romanesque age" that incorporated the ideas of Jean Hubert&action=edit&redlink=1 "Jean Hubert (archaeologist) (not yet written)") and Marcel Durliat"). For Louis Grodecki"), there is a block of architecture with wooden carpentry roof structures, a kind of "first Romanesque art" of the North distinct and symmetrical that would be opposed to the "first southern Romanesque art".[19]​[20]​[21]​.

In 1951, the Benedictines of the abbey of Sainte-Marie de La Pierre-qui-Vire) founded the éditions Zodiaque") and the collection La nuit des temps, specialized in Romanesque art, which published 88 works on the entire Romanesque world between 1954 and 1999.

Any definition of Romanesque architecture is necessarily reductionist insofar as this architecture comprises achievements of a wide variety and was built over a long period. The term Romanesque is sometimes attributed to buildings whose dating is very uncertain, simply because they contain techniques or an atmosphere that appear Romanesque to the modern observer: barrel vaults, semicircular arches or historiated capitals, for example. But there are Romanesque buildings with wooden roofs and without vaulting, and in others the barrel vault is rather the exception compared to the slightly pointed arch; and also, many of the Romanesque capitals were not historiated.

For this reason, Romanesque architecture is defined with more subjective criteria, more or less well supported according to what one thinks one knows about the religious interpretations of those times. It could be said - even if this presentation does not apply well to the ascending character of the great Auvergne churches - that Romanesque architecture, particularly in the small buildings, gave the visitor the feeling of a certain massiveness that evokes more the shadow, the penumbra or that "deep light" of which the essayist Yves Bonnefoy spoke, than the luminous flights of the Gothic stained glass windows.

Another interpretation is that this architecture would not show an ancestry with a glorious purpose, but rather a "downward transcendence", in a cryptic and initiatory way to achieve an atmosphere of original mystery. In fact, the experience of light in the Christian church had already been decided since the construction of the first basilicas, but the push due to the choice of heavy stone vaults (which replaced wooden carpentry in large buildings or to escape fires from wooden trusses) forced the walls to be strengthened and narrow openings to be drilled: this "deep light" was, therefore, more of a technical restriction than a liturgical choice. Thus, during the second Romanesque period, different vaults (groin and ribbed) were created and reinforced with different counter-thrusts (semi-vaults of the stands) or reinforcements (buttresses), which allowed light to enter by drilling larger holes in the wall surfaces.[22]​.

Art historians, however, have tried to characterize Romanesque architecture by its modes of coverage (barrel and cross vaults, domes), by the types of supports (thick walls provided or not with arcades and generally pierced by small windows with semicircular finials, walls reinforced with pilasters attached on the inside or buttresses on the outside) and by its decorative grammar (repertoire of ovas, pearls, fretwork, palm trees and foliage, roses and acanthus leaves, Ionic and Corinthian capitals).[23]​.

Contenido

Después de un período de investigación y desarrollo a veces tortuoso, los grandes componentes clásicos mediterráneos y paleocristianos se unieron definitivamente con las aportaciones germánicas al arte románico. La arquitectura románica encuentra sus fuentes en el arte prerrománico y, en particular, en el arte carolingio y se desarrolla en paralelo con la arquitectura otoniana. Esta gestación está en el centro del intento de organización germánica de los siglos al por los carolingios y los otonianos.

The Carolingian and Ottonian Empires

The history of Carolingian Europe begins with the rise of a well-known aristocratic family at the beginning of the century. This dynasty of the Carolingians reigned in Europe from the 750s to the end of the century and achieved, with the support of the pope, the near unity of the Christian West under Charlemagne (r. 768-814), crowned emperor in 800. The reconstitution of Western unity developed in three directions: to the southeast, in Italy; to the southwest, towards Spain; and to the east, in Germany. The Germanic and especially Saxon horizon attracted Charlemagne to the east. Above all, he was concerned about reestablishing the ancient Roman empire of which he would be the leader. After his death he was succeeded by his son Ludovico Pio (r. 813-840) and, upon his death, his sons and grandchildren of Charlemagne agreed in 843, in the Treaty of Verdun, to divide the Carolingian Empire into three regions: to the west, the Francia occidentalis of Charles the Bald (r. 843-877), crowned king in 848 in Orleans; to the east, the Francia orientalis of Louis the Germanicus (r. 843-876) and between the two, the Media France of Lothair I who retained the title of emperor (r. 817-855), and transmitted it to his eldest son Louis III (r. 876-882), and divided the rest of his empire: Lotharingia corresponded to Lothair II (r. 855-869) and Provence to Charles of Provence (r. 855-863). After the death of Charles the Fat (r. 881-887) in 888, there was a rapid breakdown of Carolingian unity. In Western France, royalty, which had once again become elective, alternated between Carolingian kings and kings of the family of Eudes, Count of Paris, hero of the defense of Paris against the Normans in 885-886. In Germania, the Carolingian dynasty died out in 911 with Louis the Child (r. -899-911) and the royal crown fell by election into the hands of Duke Conrad of Franconia. He passed it on to Henry I (r. 919-936) and his son Otto I (r. 936-973) founded an imperial line resuming Carolingian politics and with the help of the pope established the Holy Roman Empire.

The Christian religion adapted to its environment and became "barbarized", then England entered Christianity and Irish monks created links with the continent that pilgrims and merchants followed. The Rhine, the Scheldt and the Meuse were routes of penetration and the first Atlantic trade marked the beginning of a new era. It was especially Gaul north of the Loire that benefited from these exchanges.

The rise of monasticism was the great event of the century for Gaul and the entire West. Kings, bishops and aristocrats installed monks in their lands and protected them. The Lateran Church perfected the liturgy that became a model for the entire West. Long before an alliance was formed between the Carolingians and the papacy, the pope appeared as the greatest moral power in the West.

Grimoald, palace steward of Austrasia, founded monasteries and installed family and friends in them. He set a policy that all Carolingians will follow: own abbeys, have monks who pray for the family and help them in their enterprises.[24]​[25]​[26]​.

The Holy Roman Empire of the Ottonians was one of the consequences of the Treaty of Verdun in 843 where Louis the German received Eastern France which corresponded to the territory of Germania. The imperial title escaped him and was transmitted, losing its meaning until the year 924. Otto I, king of Saxony from the year 936, was victorious over the Hungarians and the Slavs, two of the many peoples who invaded the West in the second half of the century. He reconquered Italy and reestablished the power that Charlemagne had previously established over Rome. In 962 he was crowned emperor in Rome and founded the Holy Roman Empire, which he placed in the inheritance of Charlemagne, who in turn had placed himself in that of the defunct Roman Empire. Otto I thus resurrected an empire that he inherited to his son Otto II in 973. The latter married Theophano Skleraina, daughter of the emperor of Byzantium, to ally himself with the Eastern Empire. When he died, he was succeeded by his son, Otto III. Still young, his mother assumed the regency and thereby reaffirmed the Byzantine influence on Ottonian art. Influenced by Gerbert of Aurillac—future Pope Sylvester II (p. 992-1003)—the king dreamed of a universal empire whose capital would be Rome.

At the same time, the Church knew a strong hierarchical organization: reformist ideas marked the episcopate and monasticism, and the meteoric expansion of the abbeys was the perfect example of this. The Church played an important role in the council of princes and the material and spiritual role of monasticism was undeniable. The monuments, some true architectural feats, were part of the heritage of the Carolingian dynasty while integrating Byzantine influences. The monastic workshops became the origin of all Ottonian art: sculptures, paintings, metalwork, illuminations. The cult of relics grew and the crypts were placed at the same level as the nave. The composition of the buildings was modified, as well as the development of the liturgy. Great pilgrimages began to be organized.[27]​.

In the 19th century, the Germanic Empire was the main artistic center of the West. The emperor and the great ecclesiastics gave a decisive boost to architecture. Ottonian architecture was inspired by both Carolingian architecture and Byzantine architecture. In fact, these two architectural styles claimed to belong to the Roman Empire and were the closest examples of art dedicated to the sovereign. But it was Carolingian art that most influenced Ottonian architecture.[28]​.

The new Europe

Around the year 1000, the most striking sign of the emergence of Christianity was the famous phrase of the monk Raoul Glaber"), who spoke of the "white cloak of churches" that covered especially Gaul and Italy. This important construction movement played a vital role through its function as an economic stimulus, the development of tools, the hiring of labor, the financing and organization of construction works. It was the center of the first and almost only medieval industry.

This constructive activity that marked the beginning of the West was linked to demography, the end of invasions, the advancement of institutions that regulated periods of military activities and placed non-combatant populations under the protection of warriors. This growth was also linked to land which, in the Middle Ages, was the basis of everything and it was at that time that the ruling class became ruralized, becoming a class of large landowners where vassalage was accompanied by a benefit, most frequently land given to peasants in exchange for royalties and services. To fulfill these obligations, they improved their farming methods, which caused an agricultural revolution throughout the centuries and which was also an intense period of land clearing.

This internal expansion of Christianity was joined by a movement of external conquest with the advance of its borders in Europe and the crusades in Muslim countries. Poland, Denmark, Norway and Sweden became Christian. The Normans settled in southern Italy, took Sicily from the Muslims and expelled the Byzantines from Italy. The Spanish Reconquista was led by Christian kings helped by mercenaries, knights and French Cluniac monks who supported the growth of the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela and played a prominent role.[24]​.

Since its foundation, Cluny Abbey benefited from an exemption from which it depended only on Rome and escaped political power and the ecclesiastical hierarchy. He dedicated himself fully to his spiritual function and his success was immediate. At the end of the century, , of which 815 were in France, were affiliated with the abbey of Burgundy and ten thousand monks were under the authority of the same father abbot. The monasteries that wanted to be independent united in the same family. Other Reformed abbeys became leaders and the movement was so powerful that it brought popes such as Gregory VII, father of the Gregorian reform, to the throne.

This radical transformation of society gave rise to new needs. In many fiefdoms, lords built feudal mottes, towers that would become strong castles and ensured divine protection through donations to monasteries or created colleges of canons.[29]​.

• - Evolution of the West from the Carolingian to the Gothic period.

• - Year 810: time of Carolingian architecture.

• - Year 900: era of Carolingian and Ottonian architecture.

• - Year 1180: period of Romanesque architecture.

The development of the Romanesque style is mainly between the and centuries, although its chronology is not strict. There are earlier examples that show incipient features of the style - already from the century -, as well as later constructions that, despite being built in the Gothic era, maintain Romanesque characteristics, especially in regions such as Asturias and Galicia, reaching in some cases until the beginning of the Renaissance.

The most common classification distinguishes between full Romanesque or simple and transitional Romanesque. The latter is often considered a variant of the first, characterized by the introduction of pointed or pointed arches, but without the use of Gothic ribbed vaults. Although its first manifestations are documented in the 19th century, it did not become widespread until the middle of that century, coexisting for a time with the full Romanesque.

Another frequent distinction is based on the degree of ornamentation, differentiating between simple Romanesque and floral Romanesque (also called rebellious). During the first stage of the style, until well into the 20th century, constructions with a solid appearance, sober decoration and a certain rough character predominated. As the century progressed, a greater elaboration of façades and windows was observed, as well as a progressive refinement in the execution.

This second phase, corresponding approximately from the middle of the century to much of the century, is characterized by ornamental exuberance and great finesse in details. The distinction between both stages is useful to establish the relative chronology of Romanesque buildings within the same region or locality, although regional variations and the influences of different artistic schools prevent establishing a universal rule.

Early Christian and pre-Romanesque antecedents

The structural components of Romanesque architecture—the chevets, the western facades and spaces, the articulations of the nave with its modes of coverage and its supports, the transepts, the straight sections of the choir and the treatment of the exterior walls—are in germ in early Christian and pre-Romanesque architecture.

The evolution of the Romanesque chevet over the centuries is linked to the multiplication of altars for increasingly numerous priests. They were of two main types: with aligned or stepped apses on each side of the apse, and with apses radiating from an ambulatory. An early experimental solution is preserved in its century state in the Euphrasian Basilica in Poreč, where the three Early Christian altars and mosaics suggest their location in three hemicycles. Still in Croatia, but in Dalmatia, some tripartite heads also appear in the and centuries.

In the centuries and , the headboards of this type are present: in Mistail"), in Switzerland, around 800; or in the church of San Miguel de Escalada, in Spain, with three original altars from 913. In the decades close to the year 1000 the headboards with apsidioles aligned on each side of the apse are present in Catalonia in the monastery of Ripoll and in San Miguel de Cuixá; in Burgundy, in the church of Saint-Vorles"); in Chatillon-sur-Seine; and in Italy, in the Aosta cathedral. There are stepped apse heads in the abbey of Cluny II and in the priory of Perrecy-les-Forges, in Burgundy; in the abbey of Notre-Dame de Déols"), in the Berry "Berry (France)"); and in Bernay"), in Normandy. From 817, the individualization of the straight section of the Poreč choir seems to have become widespread in Inden-Kornelimünster") and then in Carolingian architecture.

The transept was known, without its exact function being known, since the century in Rome, as in the ancient Basilica of Saint Peter, in Saint John Lateran or in Saint Paul Outside the Walls. This function was already perfectly established at the beginning of the century in the church of St. Michael in Hildesheim, where it welcomed more altars arranged in the apsidioles. Between these two dates, in the Saint-Gall plan (around 820) altars are seen in an eastern transept, and around the year 1000, there is also a transept with apsidioles that house altars in the abbey of San Miguel de Cuixá.

The chevets with ambulatory that extend the side naves and that allow circulation to the mausoleums or relics without disturbing the celebrations were present in ancient early Christian Rome, in the basilicas of Saints Peter and Marcellin), in San Sebastian de las Catacombs, in Saint Agnes Outside the Walls and in Saint Lawrence Outside the Walls. They announce the first medieval chevet of Saint Michael of Hildesheim, from the beginning of the century. In the Carolingian era, the abbey of Saint-Germain in Auxerre and the church of Saint-Genest in Flavigny-sur-Ozerain") had already developed circulation on two levels serving the apsidioles. In the abbey of Saint-Jean-du-Mont de Thérouanne"), three radiant chapels inserted in the ambulatory announce at the beginning of the century the solution of the abbey of Saint Phillibert of Tournus.

The two-tiered heads are found in early Christian Africa in Benian"), Tipasa and Djemila and in Gaul in the centuries and in Saint-Laurent de Grenoble") with its trefoiled plan. The evolution went from the quadrangular chapels to those arranged in semicircles around 1020 in the collegiate church Saint-Aignan d'Orléans")[30]​ and in the cathedral of Chartres.[31]​.

• - Evolution of the first headers.

• - Euphrasian Basilica in Poreč.

• - Inden-Kornelimünster").

• - Abbey of San Miguel de Cuixá.

• - St. Michael's Church in Hildesheim.

• - Saint-Aignan de Orléans").

The characteristic appearance of the elevations of the Romanesque chevets is present in the early Christian architecture of the basilica of Saint Vitale in Ravenna and in the Carolingian architecture in the abbey of Saint Germain in Auxerre and in the church of Saint-Genest in Flavigny-sur-Ozerain. This pyramidal shape is reinforced when there is a tower in the transept crossing, as in the church of St. Michael in Hildesheim at the beginning of the 19th century. Carolingian westwerks or Ottonian westwerks of the type of Corvey Abbey are found in the abbey of Jumièges, in Normandy, at the beginning of the century and in Alsace, at the heart of the century, in the collegiate church of Saint-Michel-et-Saint-Gandolphe in Lautenbach, in the abbey of Saint-Étienne in Marmoutier and in the church of Sainte-Foy in Sélestat").[31]​.

• - Corvey Abbey.

• - Jumièges Abbey.

• - Lautenbach.

• - Abbey of Saint-Étienne de Marmoutier.

• - Sainte-Foy Church of Sélestat").

The time of experiences

From a few decades before the year 1000 - a time of which there are only vestiges or reports of excavations - and until the first quarter of the century, it was the time of experimentation. The evolutions appear in particular in the heads and in the vaulting systems, in the notions of span and rhythm provided by the attached columns and composite pillars, in the rigging and carved stone, in the development of the crypt-rooms. At the beginning of the century, Burgundy, the Loire Valley, Poitou, Auvergne and Catalonia were the most innovative regions where research was reserved for great achievements: the cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand, the collegiate churches of Saint-Aignan in Orléans") and Saint-Vorles"), in Chatillon-sur-Seine, the abbey churches of Saint Philip of Tournus, of Saint-Bénigne in Dijon, of Cluny II, of Saint Michael of Cuixá and of Saint Martin du Canigó, the convent priory of Fleury Abbey in Perrecy-les-Forges and the church of Saint-Généroux").

The needs that made the eastern part of the churches evolve were related to the number of priests, which were increasingly numerous, and to the routing of the faithful towards the relics, which had to be done without disturbing the liturgy. The first response consisted of multiplying the chapels by juxtaposing, on both sides of the axial apse, aligned apsidioles. It was the organization adopted in the abbey of San Miguel de Cuixá, in Roussillon "Roussillon (region)"), a construction begun in 956 and whose altar was consecrated in 975, and in Chatillon-sur-Seine, where the Saint-Vorles church is located), between 980 and 1016, with a plan that did not solve the problem of circulations. The head of stepped chapels was another solution sophisticated that was found at the beginning of the century in Normandy, in Bernay"), and in the priory of Perrecy-les-Forges, which depended on the abbey of Fleury, near Orleans.

The response to the problem of independent circulation of the faithful to access the relics involved the creation of an ambulatory around the choir that isolated the celebrations at the main altar and that allowed the distribution of radiant apses in which to arrange secondary altars. If the example of the cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand, which served as a model for the collegiate church Saint-Aignan d'Orléans") (1017-1029), is known only through excavations, its crypt is a sketch of that of the church of Saint Phillibert of Tournus consecrated in 1019, whose chancel is still partially preserved. It was built on a crypt of the same floor where the choir and apse are surrounded by an ambulatory that serves some quadrangular chapels.

The ambulatory with radiating chapels defined in Saint Phillibert of Tournus was not questioned in Romanesque architecture. Only the number and shape of the chapels, the visual passages between the ambulatory, the choir and the chapels or the proportions of the volumes that make up the chancel varied.

The fundamental creations, 1020-1060

In the second quarter of the century, factories under construction multiplied due to the impulse of the lords who endowed the monasteries and monks who created new priories and rural churches. Interesting buildings were built in Provence and Languedoc. This strong activity allowed architects to acquire a certain mastery and create a vocabulary of forms that contributed to defining and disseminating Romanesque architecture.

The headers.

The evolution of the chevets involved an increase in the openings arranged between the choir, the ambulatory and the chapels, which provided a certain lightness to the walls. A better harmony of the exterior volumes was also sought through the modulated superimposition of the elements.

The sections.

The cell section, so important in Romanesque architecture, was already perfectly defined in the crypt of the Saint-Etienne cathedral of Auxerre, dated between 1023 and 1035. The composite pillar had also replaced the column. The square core receives the deliveries of the edges of the vaults and the columns support the large arcades and the transverse arches that receive a main arch in the central part of the room.[41]​.

The western facades.

After the chancels, the architects became interested in the western facades of the churches. In the abbey of Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire, Abbot Gauzlin, half-brother of King Robert the Pious, built a portico tower capable of serving as a model to all Gaule. Traditional but ambitious in construction, this porch tower is built on an almost square plan with sides of about , with an area of ​​two floors. The ground floor has a height of .

The ground floor is open on three sides by triple arches - the middle one being wider than the other two - and remains closed to the east by the nave wall itself. These semicircular arches with double projections rest on rectangular pillars, in the north and south, and cruciform, in the west. They are reinforced with a half column on each side and by powerful buttresses on the pillars of the two corners. To the east, the columns are supported by large projections thick enough to accommodate spiral staircases. On each side of the central door, high semicircular arches were connected. The porch is divided into nine sections covered with groin vaults in blocks separated by wide semicircular transverse arches.

The ground floor reproduces the divisions of the ground floor. The pillars are joined by wide semicircular beams that support the groin vaults, except for the eastern ones, which touch the wall of the nave, which are dome-shaped. In that eastern wall three semicircular arch niches are covered in an oven vault. Probably, they housed altars, the middle one dedicated to the archangel Saint Michael in accordance with the custom of the dedications of the upper rooms or chapels.[42]​[43]​.

The expansion of the second half of the 11th century

In the second half of the century, new spaces were opened for Romanesque architecture. The Norman conquest of England in 1066 by William the Conqueror, the withdrawal of Islam in northern Spain and the development of pilgrimages, the relations of the almost isolated south-west of France with Poitou and the Spanish provinces, the financial contributions of the English possessions and the reform of the Catholic Church that provided more resources to the communities, led to an explosion of buildings and an evolution of the Romanesque architectural style.

Parallel to a first southern Romanesque art, which sought to vault buildings, it can be thought that there was a first northern Romanesque art[19]​ that remained very faithful for a certain time to the use of wooden carpentry on the roofs, especially for the naves, thus simplifying the elevation problems.

Built around 1049-1057, the small church Saint-Étienne de Vignory") has a nave built on a perfectly articulated elevation with fonts crowned by an impost and a wall surface with three levels of openings to lighten it without having the justification of a tribune.[32]​.

The dukes of Normandy were marked by a deep spiritual need and it was necessary to fill the void left by the Viking invasions in that region in which many pre-Romanesque settlements had not survived, and where new foundations were slow to flourish. William the Conqueror chose Caen as the second capital of his duchy. He committed to founding two monasteries with his wife that were to be decisive for Norman architecture. At his death he had built 17 convents for monks and 6 for nuns. He wanted the buildings to which his name was attached to surpass in magnificence those that rose everywhere.[50]​.

On December 25, 1066, William was crowned king of England and the extraordinary material success of the Normans was reflected in the church of Saint-Etienne in Caen. If the ambitious plan was probably conceived before the conquest of England, the overwhelming success of 1066 allowed its rapid execution because William did not hesitate to spoil, for the benefit of the abbeys of Caen, the main foundation of Harold II, the abbey church of Waltam" (in Essex), consecrated a few years before (1060).[51]

[52]

In England after 1066, the complete rebuilding of England's Saxon cathedrals by the Normans represented the most important program of ecclesiastical buildings in medieval Europe and the largest buildings erected in Christian Europe since the end of the Roman Empire. All of England's medieval cathedrals, except Salisbury, Lichfied and Wells, have traces of Norman architecture. Peterborough Cathedral, Durham Cathedral and Norwich Cathedral are almost completely Norman and in others there are still important parts: the naves of Ely Cathedral, Gloucester Cathedral and Southwell Minster, the transept of Winchester Cathedral.[53]

The time of maturity

The end of the century was marked by the height of the power of the Abbey of Cluny, which reached around the year 1000 a thousand priories scattered throughout Europe, with some ten thousand religious: nothing was too good to magnify the house of God. In reaction to this waste of means, monasticism undergoes a crisis with the creation of new orders that wish to renounce the goods of this world, which will manifest itself in constructions of great poverty. This new state of mind will have great importance in artistic creation and around 1130-1140, a new aesthetic ideal takes shape in these communities.

Cluny Abbey.

The abbey of Cluny III was on the scale and in the image of the power of the order. It had to accommodate two to three hundred resident monks, converts - who deal with manual labor and the secular affairs of a monastery, in order to allow the full contemplative life of the monks -, staff and visitors. If today only the south arm of the great transept, three sections of the side naves and two chapels remain, the plans and excavation campaigns show a church as long as the nave. The architectural celebration is of great ambition, with a chancel with an ambulatory and five radiating chapels, a double transept dominated by four towers, a nave and a choir with five naves, as in Saint Peter's in Rome. It was the largest building in the West, and its abbot, who reported solely to the pope, was one of the most important figures in Christendom.

Paray-le-Monial, a replica of Cluny.

The Basilica of Paray-le-Monial "Basilica of the Sacred Heart (Paray-le-Monial)") is a relatively faithful replica of the Cluny Abbey with reduced dimensions and a less ambitious architectural part. As in Cluny, its ambulatory is narrower than the corresponding side nave and there is a strong difference in level with the apse. The vaults of the choir and aisles have an identical height to that of the nave and transept. The hemicycle takes up Cluny's type of tall columns, the two levels of windows, the arcades and the attached columns. Paray-le-Monial, like Cluny, is characterized by its external austerity as opposed to an internal plastic investigation of great wealth.

An important difference appears with Cluny, where the architect wanted to reduce the scope of the central nave to a height unprecedented in Romanesque architecture. It creates a cantilever with strongly projecting chords at each level of the elevation and employs overlapping orders with fluted pilasters. This superimposition of orders found in Paray-le-Monial without the concern of the overhang is often taken up in Burgundy and beyond.

The churches of Auvergne.

In Auvergne, architects remained faithful to the barrel vault, with a particular interest in the inarticulate wall surfaces and the diaphragmatic arches that separated the nave from the transept, pierced with holes. The crypt, which in other places was already tending to disappear, is still present in some buildings in Auvergne. The diffusion of light is especially elaborate, as is the exterior decoration with the assembly of different stones and sets of rigging taken from the Early Middle Ages. The basilica of Notre-Dame-du-Port in Clermont-Ferrand has a crypt and a chancel with a decoration of polychrome stones.

From Romanesque to Gothic

In the century the decline of Romanesque art began in the regions where it had not truly developed. In the Île-de-France and the Loire Valley, no more were built in this style after the years 1140-1160. You see the emergence of a new style there. The master masons of Île-de-France gave the pointed vault its true role, drawing the logical consequences and bringing to perfection the vaults that launch over higher and higher naves, with more and more light, with more and more clarity of the great cathedrals.

The area of ​​development of this new Gothic architecture roughly follows the royal domain passing through Reims, Provins, Sens, Etampes, Mantes, Gournay, Amiens and Saint-Quentin. The oldest pointed vaults are found around 1125 in the ambulatory of the abbey church of Notre-Dame de Morienval"), in the aisles of the church of Saint-Etienne de Beauvais"), in the porch of the priory church of Saint-Leu-d'Esserent"), in the right section of the choir of Saint-Pierre de Montmartre") in Paris, in the lower hall and in the chapel of the bishop of Meaux and in the choir of the church of Lucheux, on the Somme.[59]​.

Romanesque art resisted better in Normandy, Burgundy and Languedoc. But it was in the southern regions marked by lower economic capacity and by cultural reasons related to an ancient Romanization, where antiquity had strongly marked the landscape that Romanesque architecture was still used at the end of the century, and even in the middle of the century. The church of Saint Trophimus in Arles "Church of Saint Trophimus (Arles)" and the abbey church of Saint-Gilles du Gard") are notable examples of Romanesque sculpture of this period.

At the same time, the new monastic orders (Cistercians, Grandmontines and Chalaisians) defined an ideal architecture with refined forms, with special attention to the quality of the stone masonry. In their networks of abbeys, they spread these principles independently of local fashions and created a timeless Romanesque architecture that defies time for its quality of construction.[60]

But the simplicity desired at the origin of the creation of these orders was quickly adapted to the new realities. Only the Carthusians respected the original ideal and conceived a type plant for their life as cenobites and hermits. The monks' independent cells consisted of three rooms: the Ave Maria; the oratory with a seat, an office and a bed in an alcove; a workshop with a garden. These cells were distributed by the cloister of the maison haute. The second part of the monastery was reserved for the common life of the religious, with the church, a small cloister, the chapter house, the refectory and its kitchen. The converts' buildings and the operational annexes were quite far apart.[17]​.

Robert de Molesme decided in 1098 to found a new monastery which he called Citeaux. The success led to the creation of new abbeys that were governed by a charter that defined the objectives of the new order, the Cistercian order, which would become one of the branches of the Gregorian Reform. The Cistercians lived in desert areas, earned their living through work and rejected the superfluous. At first they were content to live in wooden buildings, then Saint Bernard of Clairvaux imagined an organization flexible enough to adapt to local limitations, but although the buildings had common characteristics, there was no standard floor plan.

The architecture and its decoration

The emergence of the decoration of Romanesque architecture begins at the end of the century when the image brutally invades the Clunician abbeys. The religious who participated in the adoption of the Gregorian reform gave it what had been rejected for a long time and recognized that an image could carry a message as relevant as a written speech for a better understanding of the mysteries of faith by the faithful.

This interest in the image evoked the time of the first Christians with one big difference, that the images left the place of worship to also establish themselves outside. Before this explosion, painted or sculpted decoration was reserved for the most sacred spaces of buildings, but its great diversity had imposed a certain caution in interpretation. The frescoes of Saint-Savin-Sur-Gartempe unify the interior space, the mosaics of the Cathedral of Cefalù or the Basilica of Saint Mark in Venice tried to reconnect with early Christian architecture and the Cathedral of Monreale is the most successful example.

At the end of the 11th century, the Gregorian reform with its liturgical modifications profoundly transformed the altar and its surroundings. The antependium became altarpieces with the new position of the officiant. The alliance of altarpieces and relics finds an extension in the altars-tombs. The receptacles of the holy remains are sometimes converted into statues-reliquaries in the image of the saint, often placed next to the altar. This new position of the priest imposed a reorganization of the choir with a displacement of the monks in the eastern sections of the nave and the creation of seats. This separation between the religious and the faithful led to the construction of ambos and gates.

If the interior decoration reconnected with the tradition of the first Christian places of worship, the Gregorian reform gave a triumphant scope to the image by inscribing it at the entrance to the buildings of worship. The portal becomes the "gate to heaven" and the link with the profane world. They are no longer systematically arranged on the west façade of the church, but can also be on the axis of a main street or a privileged access. For the religious inside the monasteries, the image was often limited to the historiated capitals and, sometimes, to capitals on pillars in cloisters and in the chapter houses.[29]​.

The main creators worked in privileged centers. The south-west of France and the north-west of Spain were marked by two generations of artists, the first of which was inspired by the minor arts, ivories and illuminations and by early Christian and even pagan patterns on sarcophagi. The artist was in search of gestures and an expressive attitude to define the Romanesque figure and the historic capitals. The second generation synthesized important artistic centers between Moissac and Santiago de Compostela, passing through Toulouse and León. They defined a type of portals that supported the desired iconography at that time and brought a new style to the sculptures in the cloisters. The master of the Moissac portal had an important influence in Quercy, Cahors, Souillac and in Limousin, in Beaulieu") and Ydes. The work of the master of the abbey of Silos in Spain was also notable.

The main buildings of architecture were: churches, monasteries, abbeys and cathedrals.

Entre los elementos arquitectónicos que destacan en el estilo románico los más característicos del mismo son:.

• - El pilar compuesto y de núcleo prismático.

• - El arco de medio punto.

• - La cubierta de bóveda de medio cañón y de arista.

• - La cúpula poligonal sobre trompas.

• - Los ábsides semicirculares en planta de cruz latina en las iglesias.

• - La planta basilical es la típica latina.

A continuación otros de los elementos arquitectónicos propios del estilo:.

• - Contrafuertes muy desarrollados.

• - Arcos fajones y arquivoltas.

• - Capiteles decorados.

• - Impostas, frisos decorativos.

• - Escultura monumental aplicada a la arquitectura.

Plant

The typical plan of a Romanesque church is the Latin basilica with four, three or five naves "Nave (architecture)") and transept "Cruise (architecture)") with projecting arms. In the head or head, which always faces east, there are three or five semicircular apses facing or forming a crown, each of them having three windows in its wall. And at the foot or entrance of the temple stands a porch or narthex flanked by two square towers. But just as rural or minor churches only consist of a simple nave and an apse without a projecting transept and without towers next to the door, so the largest ones above all, those of large monasteries or the sanctuaries visited by numerous pilgrimages usually offer a very large transept and transept "Cruise (architecture)"), as well as having extended side naves around the main chapel constituting the ambulatory or semicircular nave that gives way to different apsidal chapels, open around of it as a crown. Some churches have the arms of the transept converted into separate apses that, with the central one, form a kind of large trefoil. The churches of the Templars and other related knightly orders are, in general, on a polygonal or circular plan and are small in size. Likewise, there are small oratories with a circular plan that were funerary chapels or that were attached to fortifications as military oratories and there are no shortage of others that, following the Byzantine style or inspiration, are arranged in the form of a Greek cross and a quatrefoil.

Buttresses

The characteristic supports of a Romanesque building are the composite pillar and the abutment or buttress attached externally to the wall. The buttresses are intended to reinforce the walls and at the same time serve as abutment or counterbalance to the arches and vaults (a service also provided by the composite pillars): they are visible from the outside, smooth and prismatic in shape. But when they are attached to the apses they frequently appear as columns that support the eaves "Cover (construction)"). The walls are made of ashlar or uneven ashlars with little regularity in the courses.

Pillars and arches

The aforementioned pillar ordinarily mounts on a cylindrical or low-height plinth "Plinth (construction)") and is composed of a simple or compound pilaster that has one or two semi-cylindrical columns attached to each front or to one of them (or instead of these, other narrower pilasters) in order to give rise to the former arches and the transversal ones or transverse arches. These columns have a base and capital also attached to the prismatic central core. There are also free-standing and paired columns, two by two, or four by four, but they are not ordinarily found in these forms but in cloisters, porticos, galleries "Gallery (room)") and mullioned windows.

The Romanesque capitals offer special interest due to the variety of their shapes and the very curious work with which they are usually decorated. Some of them preserve classic reminiscences of a degenerate Corinthian flavor but the vast majority are formed from a thick prism or a pyramidal trunk or an inverted cone whose fronts have sculpted interlaced geometric work or plant motifs that surround it in the form of leaves or symbolic and historical matters. The capital is crowned by a thick abacus "Abaco (architecture)"), called cymatium, which is almost always decorated with moldings or other ornaments typical of the style and frequently has a series of square modillions that look like battlements on its lower part. In twin or juxtaposed columns, the abacus usually covers the entire group of them, thus uniting their capitals.

The bases of the columns have the Tuscan or Attic shape but with the lower torus wide and flattened and they usually have in the spandrels or angles of the plinth a whimsical figurine or a claw that appears to hold with the plinth the curved molding or torus that rests on it. In the century the bases were frequently decorated with different works typical of the style, which was already used at some point in Visigothic architecture (and much more so in Roman architecture) as seen in the church of San Pedro de la Nave.

The construction arches rest immediately on the aforementioned abacus and are semicircular or banked and almost always double or triple, that is, each one of them consists of two or three semi-rings attached one below the other, with the one above being wider. When it is decorated with moldings themselves, the second period of the style is denounced and they are presented in the form of a thick baton, bordering the corner of the arch. Also typical of the second period (century) is the pointed arch, also called pointed arch, which is sometimes found in Romanesque buildings as a constructive means to reduce lateral thrust (without this being an indication of Gothic style if the ribbed vault is missing) and never as an ornament. However, in some Romanesque buildings, influenced by Muslim architecture, lobed and interlocking arches, either ornamental or constructive, are found. But the latter only in cloister arcades or in equivalent works.

inner cover

The interior cover of the naves and different rooms generally consists of the half-barrel vault—sometimes pointed like the arches—for the central nave; edge or quarter-barrel for the sides and shell or quarter-sphere for the apses, rising above the transept a polygonal dome supported by squinches (in Persian style) that are placed in the angles or corners resulting from the meeting of the main arches. These squinches are made up of a semi-conical vault or a series of degrading arches that do the same job. Sometimes, depending on the school to which the building belongs, the central nave has a wooden roof or lacks a dome or, on the contrary, has it truly spherical and raised on Byzantine-style pendentives. The difficulty and the greatest difference found in these buildings lie in the problem of combining the vaulting of all the naves with sufficient lighting in the central one and, furthermore, in giving the transept or the meeting of the naves a very stable balance and a proportionate roof: the various solutions given to this double problem constitute the main differences of the architectural schools of the Romanesque style.

Outer cover

The exterior cover or roof insists on the vaults by means of a simple wooden framework that rests on them, but in the century this framework becomes independent and is supported only by the walls so as not to load the vaults and domes with weight. Above the polygonal dome of the transept rises a prismatic lantern, either forming a body with it or being independent as a dome. This lantern ends with a pyramidal roof, the whole resembling a tower with a wide base and low height that, at times, also functions as a bell tower.

Doors and windows

The doors are formed by a series of round concentric arches in degradation, the archivolts, supported by separate columns so that the entire complex forms a kind of flared and molded arch, contributing to the greatest visual effect the same thickness of the wall that usually forms a projecting body there. Some doorways lack a lintel and a tympanum, but they are generally provided with both, and then symbolic or iconistic reliefs are sculpted on the last one, and on the sides of the doorway or on the jambs, and even in the flared arch itself, various series of ornamental work in relief are arranged, sometimes flanking the entrance to the most sumptuous churches with statues.

The windows almost always open on the façade and in the apse and sometimes in the side walls. They are much taller than they are wide and end at the top in a double arch, generally flat or sharp-edged, supported on small columns like those on the façade and when these arches are surrounded by fine moldings or batons or the windows have left their original narrowness, they belong to the second period of the style. There are also mullioned windows, oculi and small rose windows, the latter corresponding to the last period.

The windows are closed with colorless or colored stained glass in some sumptuous churches or with translucent sheets of alabaster or crystalline plaster or with simple lattices "Lattice (architecture)") of perforated stone and in poor churches with simple white cloths waxed or impregnated with turpentine. Hence, the windows of this period must have been small (the same as in the previous one) until the use of large stained glass windows was tested and generalized.

Cornices

The cornices form a continuous fascia on pilasters and walls and after the abacuses of the capitals and adorn the frontispiece "Fronton (architecture)") placed above the doorway or below the windows. They have ornaments and moldings and are often (like the pediment and the eaves or roof tiles, which are also cornices) supported by corbels or by series of small blind arches.

Ornamentation

The typical ornamentation of the Romanesque style is manifested mainly in the cornices, archivolts, capitals, doors and windows and consists of a set of broken geometric lines or armholes, banknotes, checkered patterns, saw teeth, diamond points, lacework, arches or blind arches, small rosettes, serpentine foliage and other plant motifs always stylized or with little imitation of nature. Iconistic reliefs and statues, masks or corbels, bestiaries (monstrous animal figures) and symbolic reliefs are also used.

The interior walls were decorated with various paintings of these motifs and religious or biblical scenes, and the floors were sometimes decorated with mosaics. As a general rule, the sculptural decoration of Romanesque buildings is closely linked to the structure, so that it serves to accentuate the most prominent members of the structure and is not a false covering for the building. However, in some buildings several figures of monsters can be observed sculpted as if crushed by the bases of the columns or in relief on the plinth of the facades with an evidently symbolic or moral idea since they do not have an architectural one.

Structure

The general structure of a Romanesque church can be inferred from what has been said about the plan, supports and vaults. It only remains to be noted that the entire interior composition is exposed externally by the buttresses that mark the sections of the floor plan. Likewise, due to the continuous fascias that indicate the divisions of the elevation. Through the windows and arches, which respond to the interior triforiums or their equivalents and to the differences in height in the naves, etc.

On the well-arranged façades there is a large cornice supported by corbels on the doorway, one or three windows or a small rose window at the top, two or three series of blind arches at different levels and a pediment or pinion bordered by a cornice at the upper end of the wall.

Hungary

In Hungary, Romanesque art properly emerged after the Christianization of the Hungarians in 1000, under King Saint Stephen I of Hungary. This art evolved with deep Germanic influences and in enormous, mainly ecclesiastical constructions, which were found in cities such as Esztergom, Székesfehérvár and Veszprém, where their enormous cathedrals (now already destroyed after the invasions of the Tatars of 1241 and Turks after 1526) served as centers of Christianity in the kingdom. All these cathedrals were founded mainly by Saint Stephen I and his successors Peter Orseolo of Hungary, Andrew I, Géza I among others, who reigned during the centuries , and .

In this way, by the middle and end of the century it was a common sight to see in Hungary both small constructions such as the church of Egregy, and others of enormous dimensions, all with closed apses, portals with three semicircular arches supported by pillars, as well as the construction of churches with three naves. Among the works that have survived to the present day is the church of Lébény, built at the end of the century and the beginning of the century, as well as the church of Ják, which finds its origins at the beginning of the century, the church of Velemér") in the century and the church of Felsőörs") in the century.

Scandinavia

In Scandinavia the Norman influence is also noticeable. The floor plans are a Latin cross, with a tower in the transept that acts as a lantern.

The cathedrals of Lund, Uppsala and Trondheim stand out.

Belgium

In Belgium, the Cathedral of Tournai anticipates the Gothic.

• - Romanesque buildings.

• - Cistercian architecture.

• - Gothic architecture.

• - This work contains a partial translation of the sections «Contexte historique» and «L'architecture et son décor» derived from «Architecture romane» of Wikipedia in French, specifically from this version, published by its editors under the GNU Free Documentation License and the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

• - Wikimedia Commons hosts a multimedia gallery on Romanesque Architecture.

• - Romanesque Circle Study Center: Visigothic, Mozarabic and Romanesque art in Europe.

• - Friends of the Romanesque: Romanesque Inventory.

• - Romanesque architecture (ARTEGUIAS).

• - Didactic pages about Art.

The discovery of Romanesque art is related to the architect Philibert de l'Orme in the century who would have carried out some surveys[4]​ and to the historians of the and centuries. After the French Revolution, some Norman emigrants to England discovered some research—such as Anglo-Norman Antiquities published in 1767 and The Architectural Antiquities of Normands[5]​ by John Sell Cotman—and observed that English "antiquaries" called "Saxon" the architectural style that dominated in their country before its conquest by the Normans in 1066, and "Norman" style from the conquest until the end of the century. In France, scholars apply, for architectural works of this period, the names "normand"), "lombard"), "byzantin" sometimes preceded by the appellation "gothique" (in the initial pejorative sense of 'art of the Goths'), or the name of "gothique ancien". with his colleagues from the "Society of Antiquaries of Normandy" (founded in 1824)—Charles de Gerville (1769-1853), Auguste Le Prévost") and Arcisse de Caumont (1801-1873)—a "moving school of architectural specialists"[6]​ who wanted to reappropriate that Norman heritage.

The archaeologist and scholar Gerville, driven by the desire for unification and universal classification typical of the scholars of the 19th century, was looking for a common name. According to historiographic tradition,[7]​ in a letter of December 18, 1818 that he sent to Le Prévost, he had the happy idea of ​​using the term roman to designate[8]​ Western Christian architecture from the reign of Charlemagne until the end of the century or the beginning of the century. He justified the choice on the one hand by an analogy with the langues romanes (Romance languages, which at that time began to be used to designate those languages ​​that had broken off from Latin) and on the other to underline its supposed[9]​ affiliation with Roman architecture, erroneously establishing a relationship between the area of ​​diffusion of that architecture and that of the Romance languages.[10]​.

Caumont, father of medieval archaeology, resumed and promoted its use in 1824 since he saw that in that architecture of the first centuries of the Middle Ages all the characteristics of Roman architecture appeared in a state of advanced degeneration. or "Neo-Greek"[12]​ and Romanesque architecture quickly replaced the then common appellations of Lombard, Saxon or Anglo-Norman, and was considered a first attempt at the artistic unification of Europe. Authors such as Victor Hugo, Stendhal or Mérimée and other writers of the Romantic generation imposed it in common use after 1860 since they sought to rehabilitate the Middle Ages and saw in Romanesque art a "dégénération" of Roman art due to the degradation of traditions and the collapse of ancient civilization, and they differentiated secular Gothic art "Secular (Catholic Church)"), characterized by its vertical impulse, from monastic Romanesque art, in which horizontality prevailed, and whose buildings had affinities with ancient art that exalted the power of the Roman Emperors.[13]​

The terminological journey of the term "roman" in various European countries allows us to "confirm that the great diversity of the monumental landscape of the medieval West creates considerable epistemological gaps in the different regions, often characterized by a geographically limited vision and sometimes tinged with ideology." The terms romanisch, in Germany, Romanesque art, in Great Britain, arte romanesque, in Spain, arte romanica, in Italy, have been, as in France, "the object of various controversies in its own linguistic culture, before being definitively established in historiography."[14]​

The study of the new architectural period followed the evolution of archeology and its limits, and went from a romantic and intuitive history of art to an early establishment of typologies. At first, Caumont and his friends defined three phases in the Romanesque period from the Roman decadence: from the century century to the century; from the end of the to the end of the century; and the century, in which the pointed arch replaced the semicircular arch, a capital difference in the shape of the arcades, which, together with others, established the distinctive character between Romanesque and Gothic architecture. Jules Quicherat") rightly restricted its meaning to the buildings of the 15th centuries.

After having defined the limits in time, Caumont sought to define common characteristics in space and outlined, in French territory, seven monumental regions defined in particular by the nature of the soil but also by differences in taste and skill that could only come from the schools. Quicherat, Viollet-le-Duc, Anthyme Saint-Paul and Auguste Choisy took up and completed the idea. In 1925, François Deshoulières in the Bulletin Monumental[16]​ proposed nine schools: Île-de-France and Campagne, Normandy, Lombardy-Rhineland, Lower Loire, South-West and Poitou, Auvergne, Burgundy, Provence and Languedoc. After the studies of Caumont, who had dated Romanesque architecture from the century to the century, the concept of Late Antiquity was created, which would go from the century to the century, ascribing Carolingian architecture to the High Middle Ages and analyzing the "century of the year one thousand" in comparison with the preceding era and no longer as a harbinger of the future.

In 1935, a Catalan architect Puig i Cadafalch (1867-1956) defined a "first Romanesque art" carried out by different peoples that spread across a large part of Europe before private schools were developed.[17][18] Pierre Francastel in 1942 redefined regional schools, replacing the term "first Romanesque art" with the "first Romanesque age" that incorporated the ideas of Jean Hubert&action=edit&redlink=1 "Jean Hubert (archaeologist) (not yet written)") and Marcel Durliat"). For Louis Grodecki"), there is a block of architecture with wooden carpentry roof structures, a kind of "first Romanesque art" of the North distinct and symmetrical that would be opposed to the "first southern Romanesque art".[19]​[20]​[21]​.

In 1951, the Benedictines of the abbey of Sainte-Marie de La Pierre-qui-Vire) founded the éditions Zodiaque") and the collection La nuit des temps, specialized in Romanesque art, which published 88 works on the entire Romanesque world between 1954 and 1999.

Any definition of Romanesque architecture is necessarily reductionist insofar as this architecture comprises achievements of a wide variety and was built over a long period. The term Romanesque is sometimes attributed to buildings whose dating is very uncertain, simply because they contain techniques or an atmosphere that appear Romanesque to the modern observer: barrel vaults, semicircular arches or historiated capitals, for example. But there are Romanesque buildings with wooden roofs and without vaulting, and in others the barrel vault is rather the exception compared to the slightly pointed arch; and also, many of the Romanesque capitals were not historiated.

For this reason, Romanesque architecture is defined with more subjective criteria, more or less well supported according to what one thinks one knows about the religious interpretations of those times. It could be said - even if this presentation does not apply well to the ascending character of the great Auvergne churches - that Romanesque architecture, particularly in the small buildings, gave the visitor the feeling of a certain massiveness that evokes more the shadow, the penumbra or that "deep light" of which the essayist Yves Bonnefoy spoke, than the luminous flights of the Gothic stained glass windows.

Another interpretation is that this architecture would not show an ancestry with a glorious purpose, but rather a "downward transcendence", in a cryptic and initiatory way to achieve an atmosphere of original mystery. In fact, the experience of light in the Christian church had already been decided since the construction of the first basilicas, but the push due to the choice of heavy stone vaults (which replaced wooden carpentry in large buildings or to escape fires from wooden trusses) forced the walls to be strengthened and narrow openings to be drilled: this "deep light" was, therefore, more of a technical restriction than a liturgical choice. Thus, during the second Romanesque period, different vaults (groin and ribbed) were created and reinforced with different counter-thrusts (semi-vaults of the stands) or reinforcements (buttresses), which allowed light to enter by drilling larger holes in the wall surfaces.[22]​.

Art historians, however, have tried to characterize Romanesque architecture by its modes of coverage (barrel and cross vaults, domes), by the types of supports (thick walls provided or not with arcades and generally pierced by small windows with semicircular finials, walls reinforced with pilasters attached on the inside or buttresses on the outside) and by its decorative grammar (repertoire of ovas, pearls, fretwork, palm trees and foliage, roses and acanthus leaves, Ionic and Corinthian capitals).[23]​.

Contenido

Después de un período de investigación y desarrollo a veces tortuoso, los grandes componentes clásicos mediterráneos y paleocristianos se unieron definitivamente con las aportaciones germánicas al arte románico. La arquitectura románica encuentra sus fuentes en el arte prerrománico y, en particular, en el arte carolingio y se desarrolla en paralelo con la arquitectura otoniana. Esta gestación está en el centro del intento de organización germánica de los siglos al por los carolingios y los otonianos.

The Carolingian and Ottonian Empires

The history of Carolingian Europe begins with the rise of a well-known aristocratic family at the beginning of the century. This dynasty of the Carolingians reigned in Europe from the 750s to the end of the century and achieved, with the support of the pope, the near unity of the Christian West under Charlemagne (r. 768-814), crowned emperor in 800. The reconstitution of Western unity developed in three directions: to the southeast, in Italy; to the southwest, towards Spain; and to the east, in Germany. The Germanic and especially Saxon horizon attracted Charlemagne to the east. Above all, he was concerned about reestablishing the ancient Roman empire of which he would be the leader. After his death he was succeeded by his son Ludovico Pio (r. 813-840) and, upon his death, his sons and grandchildren of Charlemagne agreed in 843, in the Treaty of Verdun, to divide the Carolingian Empire into three regions: to the west, the Francia occidentalis of Charles the Bald (r. 843-877), crowned king in 848 in Orleans; to the east, the Francia orientalis of Louis the Germanicus (r. 843-876) and between the two, the Media France of Lothair I who retained the title of emperor (r. 817-855), and transmitted it to his eldest son Louis III (r. 876-882), and divided the rest of his empire: Lotharingia corresponded to Lothair II (r. 855-869) and Provence to Charles of Provence (r. 855-863). After the death of Charles the Fat (r. 881-887) in 888, there was a rapid breakdown of Carolingian unity. In Western France, royalty, which had once again become elective, alternated between Carolingian kings and kings of the family of Eudes, Count of Paris, hero of the defense of Paris against the Normans in 885-886. In Germania, the Carolingian dynasty died out in 911 with Louis the Child (r. -899-911) and the royal crown fell by election into the hands of Duke Conrad of Franconia. He passed it on to Henry I (r. 919-936) and his son Otto I (r. 936-973) founded an imperial line resuming Carolingian politics and with the help of the pope established the Holy Roman Empire.

The Christian religion adapted to its environment and became "barbarized", then England entered Christianity and Irish monks created links with the continent that pilgrims and merchants followed. The Rhine, the Scheldt and the Meuse were routes of penetration and the first Atlantic trade marked the beginning of a new era. It was especially Gaul north of the Loire that benefited from these exchanges.

The rise of monasticism was the great event of the century for Gaul and the entire West. Kings, bishops and aristocrats installed monks in their lands and protected them. The Lateran Church perfected the liturgy that became a model for the entire West. Long before an alliance was formed between the Carolingians and the papacy, the pope appeared as the greatest moral power in the West.

Grimoald, palace steward of Austrasia, founded monasteries and installed family and friends in them. He set a policy that all Carolingians will follow: own abbeys, have monks who pray for the family and help them in their enterprises.[24]​[25]​[26]​.

The Holy Roman Empire of the Ottonians was one of the consequences of the Treaty of Verdun in 843 where Louis the German received Eastern France which corresponded to the territory of Germania. The imperial title escaped him and was transmitted, losing its meaning until the year 924. Otto I, king of Saxony from the year 936, was victorious over the Hungarians and the Slavs, two of the many peoples who invaded the West in the second half of the century. He reconquered Italy and reestablished the power that Charlemagne had previously established over Rome. In 962 he was crowned emperor in Rome and founded the Holy Roman Empire, which he placed in the inheritance of Charlemagne, who in turn had placed himself in that of the defunct Roman Empire. Otto I thus resurrected an empire that he inherited to his son Otto II in 973. The latter married Theophano Skleraina, daughter of the emperor of Byzantium, to ally himself with the Eastern Empire. When he died, he was succeeded by his son, Otto III. Still young, his mother assumed the regency and thereby reaffirmed the Byzantine influence on Ottonian art. Influenced by Gerbert of Aurillac—future Pope Sylvester II (p. 992-1003)—the king dreamed of a universal empire whose capital would be Rome.

At the same time, the Church knew a strong hierarchical organization: reformist ideas marked the episcopate and monasticism, and the meteoric expansion of the abbeys was the perfect example of this. The Church played an important role in the council of princes and the material and spiritual role of monasticism was undeniable. The monuments, some true architectural feats, were part of the heritage of the Carolingian dynasty while integrating Byzantine influences. The monastic workshops became the origin of all Ottonian art: sculptures, paintings, metalwork, illuminations. The cult of relics grew and the crypts were placed at the same level as the nave. The composition of the buildings was modified, as well as the development of the liturgy. Great pilgrimages began to be organized.[27]​.

In the 19th century, the Germanic Empire was the main artistic center of the West. The emperor and the great ecclesiastics gave a decisive boost to architecture. Ottonian architecture was inspired by both Carolingian architecture and Byzantine architecture. In fact, these two architectural styles claimed to belong to the Roman Empire and were the closest examples of art dedicated to the sovereign. But it was Carolingian art that most influenced Ottonian architecture.[28]​.

The new Europe

Around the year 1000, the most striking sign of the emergence of Christianity was the famous phrase of the monk Raoul Glaber"), who spoke of the "white cloak of churches" that covered especially Gaul and Italy. This important construction movement played a vital role through its function as an economic stimulus, the development of tools, the hiring of labor, the financing and organization of construction works. It was the center of the first and almost only medieval industry.

This constructive activity that marked the beginning of the West was linked to demography, the end of invasions, the advancement of institutions that regulated periods of military activities and placed non-combatant populations under the protection of warriors. This growth was also linked to land which, in the Middle Ages, was the basis of everything and it was at that time that the ruling class became ruralized, becoming a class of large landowners where vassalage was accompanied by a benefit, most frequently land given to peasants in exchange for royalties and services. To fulfill these obligations, they improved their farming methods, which caused an agricultural revolution throughout the centuries and which was also an intense period of land clearing.

This internal expansion of Christianity was joined by a movement of external conquest with the advance of its borders in Europe and the crusades in Muslim countries. Poland, Denmark, Norway and Sweden became Christian. The Normans settled in southern Italy, took Sicily from the Muslims and expelled the Byzantines from Italy. The Spanish Reconquista was led by Christian kings helped by mercenaries, knights and French Cluniac monks who supported the growth of the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela and played a prominent role.[24]​.

Since its foundation, Cluny Abbey benefited from an exemption from which it depended only on Rome and escaped political power and the ecclesiastical hierarchy. He dedicated himself fully to his spiritual function and his success was immediate. At the end of the century, , of which 815 were in France, were affiliated with the abbey of Burgundy and ten thousand monks were under the authority of the same father abbot. The monasteries that wanted to be independent united in the same family. Other Reformed abbeys became leaders and the movement was so powerful that it brought popes such as Gregory VII, father of the Gregorian reform, to the throne.

This radical transformation of society gave rise to new needs. In many fiefdoms, lords built feudal mottes, towers that would become strong castles and ensured divine protection through donations to monasteries or created colleges of canons.[29]​.

• - Evolution of the West from the Carolingian to the Gothic period.

• - Year 810: time of Carolingian architecture.

• - Year 900: era of Carolingian and Ottonian architecture.

• - Year 1180: period of Romanesque architecture.

The development of the Romanesque style is mainly between the and centuries, although its chronology is not strict. There are earlier examples that show incipient features of the style - already from the century -, as well as later constructions that, despite being built in the Gothic era, maintain Romanesque characteristics, especially in regions such as Asturias and Galicia, reaching in some cases until the beginning of the Renaissance.

The most common classification distinguishes between full Romanesque or simple and transitional Romanesque. The latter is often considered a variant of the first, characterized by the introduction of pointed or pointed arches, but without the use of Gothic ribbed vaults. Although its first manifestations are documented in the 19th century, it did not become widespread until the middle of that century, coexisting for a time with the full Romanesque.

Another frequent distinction is based on the degree of ornamentation, differentiating between simple Romanesque and floral Romanesque (also called rebellious). During the first stage of the style, until well into the 20th century, constructions with a solid appearance, sober decoration and a certain rough character predominated. As the century progressed, a greater elaboration of façades and windows was observed, as well as a progressive refinement in the execution.

This second phase, corresponding approximately from the middle of the century to much of the century, is characterized by ornamental exuberance and great finesse in details. The distinction between both stages is useful to establish the relative chronology of Romanesque buildings within the same region or locality, although regional variations and the influences of different artistic schools prevent establishing a universal rule.

Early Christian and pre-Romanesque antecedents

The structural components of Romanesque architecture—the chevets, the western facades and spaces, the articulations of the nave with its modes of coverage and its supports, the transepts, the straight sections of the choir and the treatment of the exterior walls—are in germ in early Christian and pre-Romanesque architecture.

The evolution of the Romanesque chevet over the centuries is linked to the multiplication of altars for increasingly numerous priests. They were of two main types: with aligned or stepped apses on each side of the apse, and with apses radiating from an ambulatory. An early experimental solution is preserved in its century state in the Euphrasian Basilica in Poreč, where the three Early Christian altars and mosaics suggest their location in three hemicycles. Still in Croatia, but in Dalmatia, some tripartite heads also appear in the and centuries.

In the centuries and , the headboards of this type are present: in Mistail"), in Switzerland, around 800; or in the church of San Miguel de Escalada, in Spain, with three original altars from 913. In the decades close to the year 1000 the headboards with apsidioles aligned on each side of the apse are present in Catalonia in the monastery of Ripoll and in San Miguel de Cuixá; in Burgundy, in the church of Saint-Vorles"); in Chatillon-sur-Seine; and in Italy, in the Aosta cathedral. There are stepped apse heads in the abbey of Cluny II and in the priory of Perrecy-les-Forges, in Burgundy; in the abbey of Notre-Dame de Déols"), in the Berry "Berry (France)"); and in Bernay"), in Normandy. From 817, the individualization of the straight section of the Poreč choir seems to have become widespread in Inden-Kornelimünster") and then in Carolingian architecture.

The transept was known, without its exact function being known, since the century in Rome, as in the ancient Basilica of Saint Peter, in Saint John Lateran or in Saint Paul Outside the Walls. This function was already perfectly established at the beginning of the century in the church of St. Michael in Hildesheim, where it welcomed more altars arranged in the apsidioles. Between these two dates, in the Saint-Gall plan (around 820) altars are seen in an eastern transept, and around the year 1000, there is also a transept with apsidioles that house altars in the abbey of San Miguel de Cuixá.

The chevets with ambulatory that extend the side naves and that allow circulation to the mausoleums or relics without disturbing the celebrations were present in ancient early Christian Rome, in the basilicas of Saints Peter and Marcellin), in San Sebastian de las Catacombs, in Saint Agnes Outside the Walls and in Saint Lawrence Outside the Walls. They announce the first medieval chevet of Saint Michael of Hildesheim, from the beginning of the century. In the Carolingian era, the abbey of Saint-Germain in Auxerre and the church of Saint-Genest in Flavigny-sur-Ozerain") had already developed circulation on two levels serving the apsidioles. In the abbey of Saint-Jean-du-Mont de Thérouanne"), three radiant chapels inserted in the ambulatory announce at the beginning of the century the solution of the abbey of Saint Phillibert of Tournus.

The two-tiered heads are found in early Christian Africa in Benian"), Tipasa and Djemila and in Gaul in the centuries and in Saint-Laurent de Grenoble") with its trefoiled plan. The evolution went from the quadrangular chapels to those arranged in semicircles around 1020 in the collegiate church Saint-Aignan d'Orléans")[30]​ and in the cathedral of Chartres.[31]​.

• - Evolution of the first headers.

• - Euphrasian Basilica in Poreč.

• - Inden-Kornelimünster").

• - Abbey of San Miguel de Cuixá.

• - St. Michael's Church in Hildesheim.

• - Saint-Aignan de Orléans").

The characteristic appearance of the elevations of the Romanesque chevets is present in the early Christian architecture of the basilica of Saint Vitale in Ravenna and in the Carolingian architecture in the abbey of Saint Germain in Auxerre and in the church of Saint-Genest in Flavigny-sur-Ozerain. This pyramidal shape is reinforced when there is a tower in the transept crossing, as in the church of St. Michael in Hildesheim at the beginning of the 19th century. Carolingian westwerks or Ottonian westwerks of the type of Corvey Abbey are found in the abbey of Jumièges, in Normandy, at the beginning of the century and in Alsace, at the heart of the century, in the collegiate church of Saint-Michel-et-Saint-Gandolphe in Lautenbach, in the abbey of Saint-Étienne in Marmoutier and in the church of Sainte-Foy in Sélestat").[31]​.

• - Corvey Abbey.

• - Jumièges Abbey.

• - Lautenbach.

• - Abbey of Saint-Étienne de Marmoutier.

• - Sainte-Foy Church of Sélestat").

The time of experiences

From a few decades before the year 1000 - a time of which there are only vestiges or reports of excavations - and until the first quarter of the century, it was the time of experimentation. The evolutions appear in particular in the heads and in the vaulting systems, in the notions of span and rhythm provided by the attached columns and composite pillars, in the rigging and carved stone, in the development of the crypt-rooms. At the beginning of the century, Burgundy, the Loire Valley, Poitou, Auvergne and Catalonia were the most innovative regions where research was reserved for great achievements: the cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand, the collegiate churches of Saint-Aignan in Orléans") and Saint-Vorles"), in Chatillon-sur-Seine, the abbey churches of Saint Philip of Tournus, of Saint-Bénigne in Dijon, of Cluny II, of Saint Michael of Cuixá and of Saint Martin du Canigó, the convent priory of Fleury Abbey in Perrecy-les-Forges and the church of Saint-Généroux").

The needs that made the eastern part of the churches evolve were related to the number of priests, which were increasingly numerous, and to the routing of the faithful towards the relics, which had to be done without disturbing the liturgy. The first response consisted of multiplying the chapels by juxtaposing, on both sides of the axial apse, aligned apsidioles. It was the organization adopted in the abbey of San Miguel de Cuixá, in Roussillon "Roussillon (region)"), a construction begun in 956 and whose altar was consecrated in 975, and in Chatillon-sur-Seine, where the Saint-Vorles church is located), between 980 and 1016, with a plan that did not solve the problem of circulations. The head of stepped chapels was another solution sophisticated that was found at the beginning of the century in Normandy, in Bernay"), and in the priory of Perrecy-les-Forges, which depended on the abbey of Fleury, near Orleans.

The response to the problem of independent circulation of the faithful to access the relics involved the creation of an ambulatory around the choir that isolated the celebrations at the main altar and that allowed the distribution of radiant apses in which to arrange secondary altars. If the example of the cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand, which served as a model for the collegiate church Saint-Aignan d'Orléans") (1017-1029), is known only through excavations, its crypt is a sketch of that of the church of Saint Phillibert of Tournus consecrated in 1019, whose chancel is still partially preserved. It was built on a crypt of the same floor where the choir and apse are surrounded by an ambulatory that serves some quadrangular chapels.

The ambulatory with radiating chapels defined in Saint Phillibert of Tournus was not questioned in Romanesque architecture. Only the number and shape of the chapels, the visual passages between the ambulatory, the choir and the chapels or the proportions of the volumes that make up the chancel varied.

The fundamental creations, 1020-1060

In the second quarter of the century, factories under construction multiplied due to the impulse of the lords who endowed the monasteries and monks who created new priories and rural churches. Interesting buildings were built in Provence and Languedoc. This strong activity allowed architects to acquire a certain mastery and create a vocabulary of forms that contributed to defining and disseminating Romanesque architecture.

The headers.

The evolution of the chevets involved an increase in the openings arranged between the choir, the ambulatory and the chapels, which provided a certain lightness to the walls. A better harmony of the exterior volumes was also sought through the modulated superimposition of the elements.

The sections.

The cell section, so important in Romanesque architecture, was already perfectly defined in the crypt of the Saint-Etienne cathedral of Auxerre, dated between 1023 and 1035. The composite pillar had also replaced the column. The square core receives the deliveries of the edges of the vaults and the columns support the large arcades and the transverse arches that receive a main arch in the central part of the room.[41]​.

The western facades.

After the chancels, the architects became interested in the western facades of the churches. In the abbey of Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire, Abbot Gauzlin, half-brother of King Robert the Pious, built a portico tower capable of serving as a model to all Gaule. Traditional but ambitious in construction, this porch tower is built on an almost square plan with sides of about , with an area of ​​two floors. The ground floor has a height of .

The ground floor is open on three sides by triple arches - the middle one being wider than the other two - and remains closed to the east by the nave wall itself. These semicircular arches with double projections rest on rectangular pillars, in the north and south, and cruciform, in the west. They are reinforced with a half column on each side and by powerful buttresses on the pillars of the two corners. To the east, the columns are supported by large projections thick enough to accommodate spiral staircases. On each side of the central door, high semicircular arches were connected. The porch is divided into nine sections covered with groin vaults in blocks separated by wide semicircular transverse arches.

The ground floor reproduces the divisions of the ground floor. The pillars are joined by wide semicircular beams that support the groin vaults, except for the eastern ones, which touch the wall of the nave, which are dome-shaped. In that eastern wall three semicircular arch niches are covered in an oven vault. Probably, they housed altars, the middle one dedicated to the archangel Saint Michael in accordance with the custom of the dedications of the upper rooms or chapels.[42]​[43]​.

The expansion of the second half of the 11th century

In the second half of the century, new spaces were opened for Romanesque architecture. The Norman conquest of England in 1066 by William the Conqueror, the withdrawal of Islam in northern Spain and the development of pilgrimages, the relations of the almost isolated south-west of France with Poitou and the Spanish provinces, the financial contributions of the English possessions and the reform of the Catholic Church that provided more resources to the communities, led to an explosion of buildings and an evolution of the Romanesque architectural style.

Parallel to a first southern Romanesque art, which sought to vault buildings, it can be thought that there was a first northern Romanesque art[19]​ that remained very faithful for a certain time to the use of wooden carpentry on the roofs, especially for the naves, thus simplifying the elevation problems.

Built around 1049-1057, the small church Saint-Étienne de Vignory") has a nave built on a perfectly articulated elevation with fonts crowned by an impost and a wall surface with three levels of openings to lighten it without having the justification of a tribune.[32]​.

The dukes of Normandy were marked by a deep spiritual need and it was necessary to fill the void left by the Viking invasions in that region in which many pre-Romanesque settlements had not survived, and where new foundations were slow to flourish. William the Conqueror chose Caen as the second capital of his duchy. He committed to founding two monasteries with his wife that were to be decisive for Norman architecture. At his death he had built 17 convents for monks and 6 for nuns. He wanted the buildings to which his name was attached to surpass in magnificence those that rose everywhere.[50]​.

On December 25, 1066, William was crowned king of England and the extraordinary material success of the Normans was reflected in the church of Saint-Etienne in Caen. If the ambitious plan was probably conceived before the conquest of England, the overwhelming success of 1066 allowed its rapid execution because William did not hesitate to spoil, for the benefit of the abbeys of Caen, the main foundation of Harold II, the abbey church of Waltam" (in Essex), consecrated a few years before (1060).[51]

[52]

In England after 1066, the complete rebuilding of England's Saxon cathedrals by the Normans represented the most important program of ecclesiastical buildings in medieval Europe and the largest buildings erected in Christian Europe since the end of the Roman Empire. All of England's medieval cathedrals, except Salisbury, Lichfied and Wells, have traces of Norman architecture. Peterborough Cathedral, Durham Cathedral and Norwich Cathedral are almost completely Norman and in others there are still important parts: the naves of Ely Cathedral, Gloucester Cathedral and Southwell Minster, the transept of Winchester Cathedral.[53]

The time of maturity

The end of the century was marked by the height of the power of the Abbey of Cluny, which reached around the year 1000 a thousand priories scattered throughout Europe, with some ten thousand religious: nothing was too good to magnify the house of God. In reaction to this waste of means, monasticism undergoes a crisis with the creation of new orders that wish to renounce the goods of this world, which will manifest itself in constructions of great poverty. This new state of mind will have great importance in artistic creation and around 1130-1140, a new aesthetic ideal takes shape in these communities.

Cluny Abbey.

The abbey of Cluny III was on the scale and in the image of the power of the order. It had to accommodate two to three hundred resident monks, converts - who deal with manual labor and the secular affairs of a monastery, in order to allow the full contemplative life of the monks -, staff and visitors. If today only the south arm of the great transept, three sections of the side naves and two chapels remain, the plans and excavation campaigns show a church as long as the nave. The architectural celebration is of great ambition, with a chancel with an ambulatory and five radiating chapels, a double transept dominated by four towers, a nave and a choir with five naves, as in Saint Peter's in Rome. It was the largest building in the West, and its abbot, who reported solely to the pope, was one of the most important figures in Christendom.

Paray-le-Monial, a replica of Cluny.

The Basilica of Paray-le-Monial "Basilica of the Sacred Heart (Paray-le-Monial)") is a relatively faithful replica of the Cluny Abbey with reduced dimensions and a less ambitious architectural part. As in Cluny, its ambulatory is narrower than the corresponding side nave and there is a strong difference in level with the apse. The vaults of the choir and aisles have an identical height to that of the nave and transept. The hemicycle takes up Cluny's type of tall columns, the two levels of windows, the arcades and the attached columns. Paray-le-Monial, like Cluny, is characterized by its external austerity as opposed to an internal plastic investigation of great wealth.

An important difference appears with Cluny, where the architect wanted to reduce the scope of the central nave to a height unprecedented in Romanesque architecture. It creates a cantilever with strongly projecting chords at each level of the elevation and employs overlapping orders with fluted pilasters. This superimposition of orders found in Paray-le-Monial without the concern of the overhang is often taken up in Burgundy and beyond.

The churches of Auvergne.

In Auvergne, architects remained faithful to the barrel vault, with a particular interest in the inarticulate wall surfaces and the diaphragmatic arches that separated the nave from the transept, pierced with holes. The crypt, which in other places was already tending to disappear, is still present in some buildings in Auvergne. The diffusion of light is especially elaborate, as is the exterior decoration with the assembly of different stones and sets of rigging taken from the Early Middle Ages. The basilica of Notre-Dame-du-Port in Clermont-Ferrand has a crypt and a chancel with a decoration of polychrome stones.

From Romanesque to Gothic

In the century the decline of Romanesque art began in the regions where it had not truly developed. In the Île-de-France and the Loire Valley, no more were built in this style after the years 1140-1160. You see the emergence of a new style there. The master masons of Île-de-France gave the pointed vault its true role, drawing the logical consequences and bringing to perfection the vaults that launch over higher and higher naves, with more and more light, with more and more clarity of the great cathedrals.

The area of ​​development of this new Gothic architecture roughly follows the royal domain passing through Reims, Provins, Sens, Etampes, Mantes, Gournay, Amiens and Saint-Quentin. The oldest pointed vaults are found around 1125 in the ambulatory of the abbey church of Notre-Dame de Morienval"), in the aisles of the church of Saint-Etienne de Beauvais"), in the porch of the priory church of Saint-Leu-d'Esserent"), in the right section of the choir of Saint-Pierre de Montmartre") in Paris, in the lower hall and in the chapel of the bishop of Meaux and in the choir of the church of Lucheux, on the Somme.[59]​.

Romanesque art resisted better in Normandy, Burgundy and Languedoc. But it was in the southern regions marked by lower economic capacity and by cultural reasons related to an ancient Romanization, where antiquity had strongly marked the landscape that Romanesque architecture was still used at the end of the century, and even in the middle of the century. The church of Saint Trophimus in Arles "Church of Saint Trophimus (Arles)" and the abbey church of Saint-Gilles du Gard") are notable examples of Romanesque sculpture of this period.

At the same time, the new monastic orders (Cistercians, Grandmontines and Chalaisians) defined an ideal architecture with refined forms, with special attention to the quality of the stone masonry. In their networks of abbeys, they spread these principles independently of local fashions and created a timeless Romanesque architecture that defies time for its quality of construction.[60]

But the simplicity desired at the origin of the creation of these orders was quickly adapted to the new realities. Only the Carthusians respected the original ideal and conceived a type plant for their life as cenobites and hermits. The monks' independent cells consisted of three rooms: the Ave Maria; the oratory with a seat, an office and a bed in an alcove; a workshop with a garden. These cells were distributed by the cloister of the maison haute. The second part of the monastery was reserved for the common life of the religious, with the church, a small cloister, the chapter house, the refectory and its kitchen. The converts' buildings and the operational annexes were quite far apart.[17]​.

Robert de Molesme decided in 1098 to found a new monastery which he called Citeaux. The success led to the creation of new abbeys that were governed by a charter that defined the objectives of the new order, the Cistercian order, which would become one of the branches of the Gregorian Reform. The Cistercians lived in desert areas, earned their living through work and rejected the superfluous. At first they were content to live in wooden buildings, then Saint Bernard of Clairvaux imagined an organization flexible enough to adapt to local limitations, but although the buildings had common characteristics, there was no standard floor plan.

The architecture and its decoration

The emergence of the decoration of Romanesque architecture begins at the end of the century when the image brutally invades the Clunician abbeys. The religious who participated in the adoption of the Gregorian reform gave it what had been rejected for a long time and recognized that an image could carry a message as relevant as a written speech for a better understanding of the mysteries of faith by the faithful.

This interest in the image evoked the time of the first Christians with one big difference, that the images left the place of worship to also establish themselves outside. Before this explosion, painted or sculpted decoration was reserved for the most sacred spaces of buildings, but its great diversity had imposed a certain caution in interpretation. The frescoes of Saint-Savin-Sur-Gartempe unify the interior space, the mosaics of the Cathedral of Cefalù or the Basilica of Saint Mark in Venice tried to reconnect with early Christian architecture and the Cathedral of Monreale is the most successful example.

At the end of the 11th century, the Gregorian reform with its liturgical modifications profoundly transformed the altar and its surroundings. The antependium became altarpieces with the new position of the officiant. The alliance of altarpieces and relics finds an extension in the altars-tombs. The receptacles of the holy remains are sometimes converted into statues-reliquaries in the image of the saint, often placed next to the altar. This new position of the priest imposed a reorganization of the choir with a displacement of the monks in the eastern sections of the nave and the creation of seats. This separation between the religious and the faithful led to the construction of ambos and gates.

If the interior decoration reconnected with the tradition of the first Christian places of worship, the Gregorian reform gave a triumphant scope to the image by inscribing it at the entrance to the buildings of worship. The portal becomes the "gate to heaven" and the link with the profane world. They are no longer systematically arranged on the west façade of the church, but can also be on the axis of a main street or a privileged access. For the religious inside the monasteries, the image was often limited to the historiated capitals and, sometimes, to capitals on pillars in cloisters and in the chapter houses.[29]​.

The main creators worked in privileged centers. The south-west of France and the north-west of Spain were marked by two generations of artists, the first of which was inspired by the minor arts, ivories and illuminations and by early Christian and even pagan patterns on sarcophagi. The artist was in search of gestures and an expressive attitude to define the Romanesque figure and the historic capitals. The second generation synthesized important artistic centers between Moissac and Santiago de Compostela, passing through Toulouse and León. They defined a type of portals that supported the desired iconography at that time and brought a new style to the sculptures in the cloisters. The master of the Moissac portal had an important influence in Quercy, Cahors, Souillac and in Limousin, in Beaulieu") and Ydes. The work of the master of the abbey of Silos in Spain was also notable.

The main buildings of architecture were: churches, monasteries, abbeys and cathedrals.

Entre los elementos arquitectónicos que destacan en el estilo románico los más característicos del mismo son:.

• - El pilar compuesto y de núcleo prismático.

• - El arco de medio punto.

• - La cubierta de bóveda de medio cañón y de arista.

• - La cúpula poligonal sobre trompas.

• - Los ábsides semicirculares en planta de cruz latina en las iglesias.

• - La planta basilical es la típica latina.

A continuación otros de los elementos arquitectónicos propios del estilo:.

• - Contrafuertes muy desarrollados.

• - Arcos fajones y arquivoltas.

• - Capiteles decorados.

• - Impostas, frisos decorativos.

• - Escultura monumental aplicada a la arquitectura.

Plant

The typical plan of a Romanesque church is the Latin basilica with four, three or five naves "Nave (architecture)") and transept "Cruise (architecture)") with projecting arms. In the head or head, which always faces east, there are three or five semicircular apses facing or forming a crown, each of them having three windows in its wall. And at the foot or entrance of the temple stands a porch or narthex flanked by two square towers. But just as rural or minor churches only consist of a simple nave and an apse without a projecting transept and without towers next to the door, so the largest ones above all, those of large monasteries or the sanctuaries visited by numerous pilgrimages usually offer a very large transept and transept "Cruise (architecture)"), as well as having extended side naves around the main chapel constituting the ambulatory or semicircular nave that gives way to different apsidal chapels, open around of it as a crown. Some churches have the arms of the transept converted into separate apses that, with the central one, form a kind of large trefoil. The churches of the Templars and other related knightly orders are, in general, on a polygonal or circular plan and are small in size. Likewise, there are small oratories with a circular plan that were funerary chapels or that were attached to fortifications as military oratories and there are no shortage of others that, following the Byzantine style or inspiration, are arranged in the form of a Greek cross and a quatrefoil.

Buttresses

The characteristic supports of a Romanesque building are the composite pillar and the abutment or buttress attached externally to the wall. The buttresses are intended to reinforce the walls and at the same time serve as abutment or counterbalance to the arches and vaults (a service also provided by the composite pillars): they are visible from the outside, smooth and prismatic in shape. But when they are attached to the apses they frequently appear as columns that support the eaves "Cover (construction)"). The walls are made of ashlar or uneven ashlars with little regularity in the courses.

Pillars and arches

The aforementioned pillar ordinarily mounts on a cylindrical or low-height plinth "Plinth (construction)") and is composed of a simple or compound pilaster that has one or two semi-cylindrical columns attached to each front or to one of them (or instead of these, other narrower pilasters) in order to give rise to the former arches and the transversal ones or transverse arches. These columns have a base and capital also attached to the prismatic central core. There are also free-standing and paired columns, two by two, or four by four, but they are not ordinarily found in these forms but in cloisters, porticos, galleries "Gallery (room)") and mullioned windows.

The Romanesque capitals offer special interest due to the variety of their shapes and the very curious work with which they are usually decorated. Some of them preserve classic reminiscences of a degenerate Corinthian flavor but the vast majority are formed from a thick prism or a pyramidal trunk or an inverted cone whose fronts have sculpted interlaced geometric work or plant motifs that surround it in the form of leaves or symbolic and historical matters. The capital is crowned by a thick abacus "Abaco (architecture)"), called cymatium, which is almost always decorated with moldings or other ornaments typical of the style and frequently has a series of square modillions that look like battlements on its lower part. In twin or juxtaposed columns, the abacus usually covers the entire group of them, thus uniting their capitals.

The bases of the columns have the Tuscan or Attic shape but with the lower torus wide and flattened and they usually have in the spandrels or angles of the plinth a whimsical figurine or a claw that appears to hold with the plinth the curved molding or torus that rests on it. In the century the bases were frequently decorated with different works typical of the style, which was already used at some point in Visigothic architecture (and much more so in Roman architecture) as seen in the church of San Pedro de la Nave.

The construction arches rest immediately on the aforementioned abacus and are semicircular or banked and almost always double or triple, that is, each one of them consists of two or three semi-rings attached one below the other, with the one above being wider. When it is decorated with moldings themselves, the second period of the style is denounced and they are presented in the form of a thick baton, bordering the corner of the arch. Also typical of the second period (century) is the pointed arch, also called pointed arch, which is sometimes found in Romanesque buildings as a constructive means to reduce lateral thrust (without this being an indication of Gothic style if the ribbed vault is missing) and never as an ornament. However, in some Romanesque buildings, influenced by Muslim architecture, lobed and interlocking arches, either ornamental or constructive, are found. But the latter only in cloister arcades or in equivalent works.

inner cover

The interior cover of the naves and different rooms generally consists of the half-barrel vault—sometimes pointed like the arches—for the central nave; edge or quarter-barrel for the sides and shell or quarter-sphere for the apses, rising above the transept a polygonal dome supported by squinches (in Persian style) that are placed in the angles or corners resulting from the meeting of the main arches. These squinches are made up of a semi-conical vault or a series of degrading arches that do the same job. Sometimes, depending on the school to which the building belongs, the central nave has a wooden roof or lacks a dome or, on the contrary, has it truly spherical and raised on Byzantine-style pendentives. The difficulty and the greatest difference found in these buildings lie in the problem of combining the vaulting of all the naves with sufficient lighting in the central one and, furthermore, in giving the transept or the meeting of the naves a very stable balance and a proportionate roof: the various solutions given to this double problem constitute the main differences of the architectural schools of the Romanesque style.

Outer cover

The exterior cover or roof insists on the vaults by means of a simple wooden framework that rests on them, but in the century this framework becomes independent and is supported only by the walls so as not to load the vaults and domes with weight. Above the polygonal dome of the transept rises a prismatic lantern, either forming a body with it or being independent as a dome. This lantern ends with a pyramidal roof, the whole resembling a tower with a wide base and low height that, at times, also functions as a bell tower.

Doors and windows

The doors are formed by a series of round concentric arches in degradation, the archivolts, supported by separate columns so that the entire complex forms a kind of flared and molded arch, contributing to the greatest visual effect the same thickness of the wall that usually forms a projecting body there. Some doorways lack a lintel and a tympanum, but they are generally provided with both, and then symbolic or iconistic reliefs are sculpted on the last one, and on the sides of the doorway or on the jambs, and even in the flared arch itself, various series of ornamental work in relief are arranged, sometimes flanking the entrance to the most sumptuous churches with statues.

The windows almost always open on the façade and in the apse and sometimes in the side walls. They are much taller than they are wide and end at the top in a double arch, generally flat or sharp-edged, supported on small columns like those on the façade and when these arches are surrounded by fine moldings or batons or the windows have left their original narrowness, they belong to the second period of the style. There are also mullioned windows, oculi and small rose windows, the latter corresponding to the last period.

The windows are closed with colorless or colored stained glass in some sumptuous churches or with translucent sheets of alabaster or crystalline plaster or with simple lattices "Lattice (architecture)") of perforated stone and in poor churches with simple white cloths waxed or impregnated with turpentine. Hence, the windows of this period must have been small (the same as in the previous one) until the use of large stained glass windows was tested and generalized.

Cornices

The cornices form a continuous fascia on pilasters and walls and after the abacuses of the capitals and adorn the frontispiece "Fronton (architecture)") placed above the doorway or below the windows. They have ornaments and moldings and are often (like the pediment and the eaves or roof tiles, which are also cornices) supported by corbels or by series of small blind arches.

Ornamentation

The typical ornamentation of the Romanesque style is manifested mainly in the cornices, archivolts, capitals, doors and windows and consists of a set of broken geometric lines or armholes, banknotes, checkered patterns, saw teeth, diamond points, lacework, arches or blind arches, small rosettes, serpentine foliage and other plant motifs always stylized or with little imitation of nature. Iconistic reliefs and statues, masks or corbels, bestiaries (monstrous animal figures) and symbolic reliefs are also used.

The interior walls were decorated with various paintings of these motifs and religious or biblical scenes, and the floors were sometimes decorated with mosaics. As a general rule, the sculptural decoration of Romanesque buildings is closely linked to the structure, so that it serves to accentuate the most prominent members of the structure and is not a false covering for the building. However, in some buildings several figures of monsters can be observed sculpted as if crushed by the bases of the columns or in relief on the plinth of the facades with an evidently symbolic or moral idea since they do not have an architectural one.

Structure

The general structure of a Romanesque church can be inferred from what has been said about the plan, supports and vaults. It only remains to be noted that the entire interior composition is exposed externally by the buttresses that mark the sections of the floor plan. Likewise, due to the continuous fascias that indicate the divisions of the elevation. Through the windows and arches, which respond to the interior triforiums or their equivalents and to the differences in height in the naves, etc.

On the well-arranged façades there is a large cornice supported by corbels on the doorway, one or three windows or a small rose window at the top, two or three series of blind arches at different levels and a pediment or pinion bordered by a cornice at the upper end of the wall.

Hungary

In Hungary, Romanesque art properly emerged after the Christianization of the Hungarians in 1000, under King Saint Stephen I of Hungary. This art evolved with deep Germanic influences and in enormous, mainly ecclesiastical constructions, which were found in cities such as Esztergom, Székesfehérvár and Veszprém, where their enormous cathedrals (now already destroyed after the invasions of the Tatars of 1241 and Turks after 1526) served as centers of Christianity in the kingdom. All these cathedrals were founded mainly by Saint Stephen I and his successors Peter Orseolo of Hungary, Andrew I, Géza I among others, who reigned during the centuries , and .

In this way, by the middle and end of the century it was a common sight to see in Hungary both small constructions such as the church of Egregy, and others of enormous dimensions, all with closed apses, portals with three semicircular arches supported by pillars, as well as the construction of churches with three naves. Among the works that have survived to the present day is the church of Lébény, built at the end of the century and the beginning of the century, as well as the church of Ják, which finds its origins at the beginning of the century, the church of Velemér") in the century and the church of Felsőörs") in the century.

Scandinavia

In Scandinavia the Norman influence is also noticeable. The floor plans are a Latin cross, with a tower in the transept that acts as a lantern.

The cathedrals of Lund, Uppsala and Trondheim stand out.

Belgium

In Belgium, the Cathedral of Tournai anticipates the Gothic.

• - Romanesque buildings.

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• - This work contains a partial translation of the sections «Contexte historique» and «L'architecture et son décor» derived from «Architecture romane» of Wikipedia in French, specifically from this version, published by its editors under the GNU Free Documentation License and the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

• - Wikimedia Commons hosts a multimedia gallery on Romanesque Architecture.

• - Romanesque Circle Study Center: Visigothic, Mozarabic and Romanesque art in Europe.

• - Friends of the Romanesque: Romanesque Inventory.

• - Romanesque architecture (ARTEGUIAS).

• - Didactic pages about Art.