Evaluation of Architectural Design

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AR 543: EVALUATION OF ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN LESSON and ACTIVITY PLAN: Week No. 6 Preliminary

Specific Learning Objectives: 1. Explain the influence of environmental, historical, and socio-cultural factors and their relevance to the development of architectural

building structures.

Topics and Activities 1. Comparative analysis of architectural elements and features of the different historic periods:

a. Byzantine b. Romanesque c. Gothic

Byzantine Architecture: 330 to 1453

Geographical

Byzantium, renamed Constantinople after Constantine the Great, and later to Istanbul, was also called the New Rome, was inaugurated as the capital of the Roman Empire in 330. It stood at the junction of the Bosphorus and the Sea of Mamorca, where Asia and Europe are divided by only a narrow strip of water. This gave it a commanding and central position. For the government of the Eastern and most valuable part of the Roman Empire.

Byzantine art pervaded all parts of the Eastern Roman Empire and was carried by traders to Greece, Serbia, Russia, Asia Minor, North Africa and further Wets where it is found in Venice, Ravenna and Perigueux. Venice, by her situation, was connecting link between the Byzantine and Frankish Empires, and a depot for merchandise from both East and West.

Geological

Constantinople had no good building stone, and local materials such as clay for bricks and rubble for concrete were employed. Other materials more monumental in character had therefore to be imported: marble was brought from the quarries in the island and along the shores of the Eastern Mediterranean to Constantinople, which was the chief marble-working center and supplied all parts of the Roman Empire.

Byzantine architecture was further considerably influenced by the multitude of Monolithic columns of such sizes as were obtainable from the different quarries. These were even introduced into the underground asterns for the water storage of this Imperial City.

Climate

Flat roofs for summer resort were combined with oriental domes and these, with small windows often high up in otherwise unbroken walls, formed the chief features of the style, and sheltering arcades surrounded the open courts.

Historical and Social

Byzantium was founded as a Greek Colony 660 B.C. and A.D. 330 became the capital of the Roman Empire. On the death of the Emperor Theodosius I (395) the Empire was finally divided and Byzantium continued to be the capital of the Eastern Empire; and throughout the Middle Ages was the bulwark of Christianity against the attacks of barbarians on the West & of Moslem in the East.

The history of the Byzantine Empire from the 5th to the 11th century is one of fluctuating and gradually declining fortunes.

There were always conflicts with Persians and the Moslems. In the 11th century the decline was accelerated because, besides having enemies of the East and North. The Empire was now attacked by Normans and Venetians. The old empire still lingered on for nearly two hundred years, but its vitality had been sapped by internal dissensions and continuous warfare against the Persians and Turks, and it was finally captured by Ottoman Turks in 1453.

Nevertheless, the spirit of the Empire had fallen, especially in Russia and in the Balkans. Constantinople has continued up to the present day as the seat of a Patriarch of the Orthodox Church.

Byzantium was an old Greek City, and so the new imperial buildings were executed by Greek craftsmen untrammeled by Roman traditions. Within the fortifications of Constantine, the new city was laid out on Roman lines, so far as the hills and site allowed.

There was the central dividing street running through a succession of six forums of which the original Augusteam was adjoined, not only by St. Sophia, the greatest glory of early Christendom, but also by the Imperial Palace, Senate House and Law Courts. The forum of Constantine, with its great porphyry column, was the center of commercial life, while in the Hippodrome bard by, the chariot races took place which was the chief amusement of New Rome, as gladiatorial combat had been old Rome.

The hippodrome held the same portion in the social life of New Rome as the colloseum and Thermae did in Old Rome, and was used for all purposes and on all occasions, for election of emperors, burying of martyrs, execution of criminals, and for triumphal processions.



Religious

In the year 313 the Edict of Milan was issued, which granted toleration to Christians, and in 330 Constantine became the capital of the First Christian Empire. It follows that the chief buildings erected in the new capital were churches for the new religions. At first they were of the basilican Early Christian type. But later the domical Byzantine Style was developed.

Architectural Character

The character Byzantine architecture, which dates from the 5th century to the present day, is determined by the novel development of the dome to cover polygonal and square plans for churches, tombs and baptisteries. The practice of using a domical system of roof construction is in strong contrast to the Early Christian timber trusses.

It may be broadly stated that the basilican type of plan belongs to Early Christian architecture, and the domed, centralized type of plan to the Byzantine.

The system of construction in hand-laid concrete, introduced by the Romans, progressively had become more like brickwork, and in this form was adopted by the Byzantines. The carcass of brickwork was first completed and allowed to settle before the interior surface sheathing unyielding marble slabs was added, and this independence of the component parts is characteristic of Byzantine construction.

Brickwork, moreover, lent itself externally to decorative. Caprices in patterns and banding, and internally it was suitable for covering with marble, mosaic, and fresco decoration. The Byzantines therefore took great pains in the manufacture of bricks, 38 mm in depth and were laid on thick beds of mortar.

This general use of brickwork necessitated special care in making mortar, which was composed of lime and sand and with crushed pottery, tiles or bricks. The decorative character of external facades depended largely on the arrangement of facing bricks, which were not laid horizontally, but sometimes obliquely, sometimes in the form of the meander fret, sometimes in the chevron or heuing, bone pattern. An attempt was also made to ornament the rough brick exteriors by use of stone bands & decorative arches.

o Frescos, term originally applied to painting on a wall while the plaster is wet, often used for any wall painting not in oil colors.

The DOME which has always been a traditional feature in the East became prevailing motif of Byzantine architecture. It was a fusion of the domical construction with the classical columnar style. Domes of various types were now placed over square compartments by means of pendentives.

o Pendentive, is the term applied to the triangular curved overhanging surface by means of which a circular dome is supported over a square or polygonal compartment.

o Domes are of three types:

a. Simple, the pendentives and domes are part of the same sphere.

b. Compound 1. The dome is not part of the same sphere as the pendentives and domes rises independently upon them. 2. The dome is raised on a high drum pierced with windows

c. Special Designs 1. Melon Dome, dome with convolutions 2. Serrated 3. Onion or Bulbous Sharp

o These domes were usually constructed of bricks on some light porous stone, such as pumice, or even of pottery. Some Byzantine Domes and Vaults were, it is believed, constructed without temporary support or centering by the simple use of large flat bricks.

Centering, a temporary structure upon which the materials of a vault or arch are supported in position until the work becomes self-supporting.

o Windows were formed in the lower portion of the dome which, in the later period, was hoisted upon a high drum, a feature which was still further developed in the renaissance architecture by the addition of an external peristyle.

Examples

Byzantine churches are distinguished by the centralized type of plan, having a dome over the nave, which in early examples, is sometimes supported by semi-domes. In later examples, the churches are much smaller and the dome is raised upon a high drum with occasionally, additional smaller domes, rising at a lower level. There is usually a narthex, or entrance porch, at the west end, and at the East end is cut off from the nave by an Iconostas or screen of pictures.

o Iconostasis, a screen in a Greek Orthodox Church on which icons (sacred image) is placed, separating the chancel from the space, open to the laity.



St. Sophia Constantinople (Hagia Sophia = divine wisdom)

Was built by Justinian by the Architects Anthemius of Tralles and Isidorus of Miletus, or the site of two successive basilican churches of the same name, erected respectively by Constantine and Theodosius II. It was the most important church in Constantinople.

o Gymnaceum, that part of a Greek house, or a Byzantine Church reserved for women.

St. Mark, Venice

Reflects the art of Byzantium which so largely influenced the architecture of Venice. The glittering, resplendent faade of the narthex faces the great Piazza of San Marco, whose vast open space, paved in marble, forms a great public atrium to the church dedicated to the sea-citys patron saint.

o Piazza, a public open space or square surrounded by buildings.

Gracanica Church

St. Sophia Novgorod

For capitals, the Roman, Ionic, Corinthian and Composite Types were sometimes used, but from these were derived a new cubiform type with convex side suited to carry a rising arch which took the place of the horizontal entablature. Over each type was placed a deep abacus of Dosseret Block a new invention which performed the function of enlarging the surface of the capital to support the wide voussirs of the arch or a thick wall.

Romanesque Architecture in Europe: 9th to 12th Century

Influences

The decline of the Roman Empire in the West led to the rise of the independent states and the nations of Europe. The coronation of the Pope of the Frankish King Charlemagne in 800 as the Holy Roman Emperor marked the beginning of a new era, with the establishment of a pan-Germanic Christian state, politically ordered and bound of both ecclesiastical and political ties to Rome.

The great monastic foundations proliferated and expanded, being closely linked with the economic revival, the fusion of Latin and Teutonic communities, and the survival of the Roman law in the monastic rule. After the middle of the 10th century, an increasing number of major buildings were vaulted, partly to guard against fire risks, partly to create strong structures to resist the raids of the Norsemen, Hungarian and the Moors.

Christianity, the chief source of education and culture, was gradually spreading throughout Northern Europe, and the erection of a church often resulted in the foundation of a city, for the Papacy had been rising to great power and influence. Religious enthusiasm and zeal found their material expression in the magnificent cathedral churches and monastic buildings. The same religious fervor led to the crusades against Moslem occupation of Palestine and the Holy Places, and affected Western art.

Until the middle of the 12th century, science, letters, art and culture were largely the monopoly of the religious orders. The schools attached to monasteries trained youths for the service of religion; monks and their pupils were often the designers of cathedrals.

The principal RELIGIOUS ORDERS were:

1. Benedictine Order (Black Monks) early 6th century houses commonly located in towns, part of the church being devoted to offices of the laity. Founded by St. Benedict in South Italy who decreed that architecture, painting, etc. are to be taught.

2. Cluniac Order founded by Abbot Odo in 910 at Cluny in Burgundy.

3. Carthusian Order, founded by ST. Bruno in 1086 Carthusian architecture is notably severe and unadorned. The character house, often remotely located provided separate cells for the monks, generally grouped around cloister garth, and the community served a simply planned church

4. Cistercian Order (White Monks) founded in 1908 at Citeaux by ST. Stephen Harding and at Clairvaux by St. Bernard. The ascetic aims of the Cistercian order produced an architecture which was at first simple and severe. In mature Cistercian planning the monks frater or refectory was located at right angles to the South walk of the cloister with the kitchen adjoining it to the West, and the frater of the conversi or lay brethren, beyond the usual form of Cistercian chapter house was an aisle hall, in contrast to those of the Benedictine and Augustinian Order and which were either rectangular or circular.

5. Secular Canons, serving principally cathedral and collegiate colleges.

ORDERS OF CANONS Regular:

6. Augustinian Canons (Black Canons regular) established in 1050. They undertook both monastic and pastoral duties in houses often located in towns and planned similarly to those of the Benedictine Order.



7. Premonstratensian Canons (White Canons regular) founded around 1100 by ST. Norbert at Premontre in Picardy.

8. Gilbertine Canons an exclusively English order founded in the 12th century by St. Gilbert of Sempringham, usually combining a house of canons of Augustine rule with another Nuns of Cistrcian rule, in conventual buildings separately planned, attached to a common church divided axially by a wall.

MILITARY ORDER

9. The Knights Templar, founded in 1119 to protect the Holy Places in Palestine and to safeguard the pilgrim to Jerusalem.

10. The Knights Hospitallers organized in 1113 but develop no characteristic architecture of its own.

11. The Mendicant Orders of Friars founded during the 13th century and headed by the Franciscans and Dominicans. Their houses were usually located in towns, where the friars preached and did charitable works among the common people.


1. The Romanesque style of the 10th to the 12th centuries was remarkable for the tentative use of a new constructive principle: the deliberate articulation of structure, in which each constructive part played a designed role in establishing equilibrium.

2. The general character of the Romanesque style is sober and dignified, while formal massing depends on the grouping of towers and the projection of transepts and choir.

3. The character depends on the employment of vaulting, based initially on Roman Methods.

4. Roman cross-vaults were used throughout Europe till the beginning of the 12th century, but they were heavy and difficult to construct and were gradually superseded by rib and panel vaulting, in which a framework of ribs supported thin stone panels. The new method consisted in designing profile of the transverse, longitudinal & diagonal ribs to which form of the panels was adapted.

5. Groins had previously been settled naturally by the intersection of the vault surfaces; this arrangement produced the quadripartite (four -part) vault.

6. If the cross-vaults were semi-cylindrical the diagonal groin would be a semi-ellipse.

In France and Germany, the vaulting ribs of a square vaulting compartment were usually semi-circular curvest starting from the same level; therefore the diagonal rib; having the longest span rose to a greater height than the transverse and longitudinal ribs, and when the paneling was filled in on the top of these ribs each vault was domical.

In England vaults were generally constructed with continuous level ridges, instead of this domical form, and the differences in height between diagonal and transverse ribs in a square vaulting compartment was equalized by stilting the latter or by making the diagonal rib a segment of a larger circle than that of the longitudinal and transverse ribs, which were semi-circular.

7. In vaulting an oblong compartment the difference between the heights of diagonal and transverse ribs was still greater than in a square compartment and produced and awkward waving line of the ribs on plan, but little attempt was made to vault any but square compartment. The difficulty of vaulting oblong nave compartments was partially surmounted.

8. In some instances, the intermediate pier was carried up as a vaulting shaft to support a rib which altered the quadripartite vaulting compartment into six parts known as Sexpartite vaulting. The main piers were usually massive than the intermediate because they supported the chief weight of the vaulting.

9. The addition of transepts and the prolongation of the sanctuary of chancel made the church a well-defined cross on plan.

10. Transepts were generally the breadth of the nave, which was usually twice the width of the aisles.

11. The choir was often raised on piers above the level of the nave and over a vaulted crypt, in which saint or martyr had been buried.

12. Towers, square octagonal or circular are prominent features of most Romanesque churches, either over the crossing, at the West end centrally with the nave, or at East end, sometimes arranged in pairs, at the west end and at the ends of transepts or at the Eastern ends of the aisles, often rising to a great height in well-marked stages pierced with windows.

13. Roman methods of craftsmanship still influenced constructive art in Europe. Walls were often roughly built, and were relieved externally by shallow buttresses or pilaster strips connected at the top by bands of horizontal moldings or by a series of semi-circular arches.

Pilaster strips is a rectangular feature in the shape of a pillar, but projecting only about one sixth of its breath from the wall.

14. Attached columns, with rough capitals supporting semi-circular arches, formed wall arcading, which was a frequent decorative feature.

15. Arcades consisted of massive circular columns or piers which supported semi-circular arches, as in the nave of Norman Cathedrals.



16. Door and window openings are very characteristic, with jambs or sides formed in a series of receding molded planes known as orders, in which are set circular shafts surmounted by a continuous abacus. The semi-circular arch above was also constructed in receding concentric rings which followed the lines of recesses below.

17. A Rose or Wheel Window was often placed over the west door.

18. Glass seems not to have come into general use till the 9th century.

19. In Italy, the traditional monolithic column was usual but in the West, in France and England, the columns were generally cylindrical and of massive proportions, built up with ashlars masonry and having a rubble core. These were treated with plutings or with spiral, trellis or chevron patterns.

20. Variations of Corinthian or Ionic Capitals were used.

21. In later times the capital was often of a cushion (cubiform shape).

22. Moldings were often elaborately carved.

23. Ornament, into which entered vegetable and animal forms, was treated conventionally and carving and sculpture were often rough.

Romanesque Architecture in Italy: 9th to 12th Century

Geographical

The long, narrow peninsula of Italy stretches from the Alps on the North, right down through the waters of the Mediterranean, almost to Africa on the South.

These geographical variations were accompanied by over differences which influenced architecture in such varying degrees that it may be most conveniently considered under:

a. Central Italy lies between Florence, commanding the passage of the Arno in the North; Pisa, the maritime power to the west; and Naples, the naval port of the South Rome, rich in ancient pagan monuments and early Christian Churches, exercised a paramount influence of architecture.

b. North Italy Milan, the capital of Lombardy enjoyed prosperity on account of its proximity to several Alpine passes and its situation in the fertile plains of Lombardy. Venice and Ravenna, which were connecting trade links between East and West and geographically under the influence of Byzantine Art.

c. South Italy and Sicily was by position especially susceptible to influence from the East and after passing under Greek and Roman rule, it formed part of the Byzantine Empire under Justinian. Sicily facing Greek on one side, Italy on another and North Africa on the third was exposed to influences from all three countries.

Geological

a. Central Italy. Tuscany possessed great mineral wealth and an abundance of stone. Various building materials were used in Rome, including bricks, volcanic tufa or peperino, travertine stone from Tivoli, and marble from Carrara. Much material was obtained from the ruins of classic buildings.

b. North Italy. The low lying plains of Lombardy supplied clay for making bricks, which used with marble from the hills, gave a special character to the architecture.

c. South Italy and Sicily. The mountains of Sicily of South Italy supplied calcareous and shelly limestone as well as many kinds of marble.

Climatic

a. Central Italy. The brilliant sunshine demanded small windows and thick walls both in cities of the plain and in cities on the hilltops.

b. North Italy. The climate varies between extremes of heat and cold. The mountains produce ice to winds in winter but protect the town from Milan to Venice from the excessive heat of the plains.

c. South Italy and Sicily. The climate is almost sub-tropical on the southern coast of Italy buildings have flat roofs and other oriental features.

Historical, Social and Religious

a. Central Italy. Pisa sent merchant fleets to the Holy Land for the Easter fair at Jerusalem. The Pisans captured and defeated the Moslems in wars and this contact with the Moslems accounts for the characteristic Pisan use of striped marbles. During this period the Pope began to exercise influence in Italian politics.

b. North Italy. In spite of the intervening Alps, the invaders who had occupied the valley of the Po kept up commercial communications with those on the Rhine by means of the Alpine Pass.



Commerce and art were the special care of the Venetians. Their close alliance with Byzantium (Constantinople) greatly increased their commerce, so that by the end of the 11th century it extended along Dalmatian, Croatian coasts to those of the Black Sea and Western Mediterranean. They raised glorious buildings and brought precious freights from the East including relics from the Holy Land. All the free cities such as Milan, Pavia, Verona and Genoa vied with one another in the beauty of their public buildings, and this spirit of rivalry encouraged the most remarkable structural advances in Italy

c. South Italy and Sicily. In 827 the Moslem landed in Sicily and gradually overran the island. The latter part of the 10th century was their most prosperous period, but bloody religious struggles ended in the downfall of the Moslem Dynasty.

Under Moslem rule even church facades were ornamented with geometrical patterns, because the Moslem religion forbids the representation of the human figure.


a. Central Italy. The basilican type of church was closely adhered to during this period; Italians were slow to adopt a new system of construction and preferred to concentrate on beauty and delicacy of ornamental detail, while the architectural character was governed by classic traditions.

The most pronounced features of faade were the ornamental arcades which rose one above the other, sometimes even into gables. This decorative use of arcaded galleries is one instance of the employment of an architectural feature having a constructive origin.

The use of marble for facing walls distinguishes Romanesque Architecture in Italy from that of the rest of Europe churches had the most part, simple open timber roofs ornamented with bright coloring. A vast number of columns from ancient Roman Temples were utilized in the new churches, and this retarded the development of the novel types.

The finely carved and slender twisted columns in the cloisters of St. Giovanni and St. Paolo, Rome are delicate variations of the Classic Type. In all parts of Italy Christian symbolism now entered into decorative carving and mosaics. The monogram of Christ, the emblems of evangelists and saints, and the whole system of symbolism, represented by trees, birds, fishes and animals, are all worked into the decorative scheme.

Examples of Central Italy

Pisa Cathedral, with Baptistery, Campanile and Campo Santo, together from one of the famous building groups of the world. It resembles other early basilican churches in plan, with long rows of columns connected by arches, double aisles, and a nave which has the usual timber roof. The exterior has bands of red and white marble, and the ground floor is faced with wall arcading, while the entrance faade is thrown into relief by tiers of open arcades which rise one above the another right into the gable end,

The Campanile is a circular tower 16 meters in diameter rising in eight storeys of encircling arcades. This world famous Leaning Tower of PISA which is the most arresting feature of this marvelous group, has been increasing its inclination sue to the subsidence in the foundations. The upper part of the tower now overhangs its base more than 4.2 meters.

The Baptistery was designed by Dioti Salvi on a circular plan with a central Nave 18.30 meters in diameter, separated by four piers and eight columns from the surrounding two-floors aisle which makes the building nearly 39.30 meters in diameter. Externally it is surrounded on the lower floors by half columns, connected by semi-circular arches, under one of which is the door, above an open arcade of small detached shafts. The structure is crowned by an outer hemispherical roof through which penetrates a truncated cone capped by a small dome, covering the central space.

b. North Italy. It was in Lombardy that the most important developments took place. The principal innovation was the development of the ribbed vault which brought about the adoption of many new constructive features. The churches are basilican in type, but naves as well as side aisles are vaulted and have external wooden roofs. Aisles are often two floors in height, while thick walls between the side chapels act as buttresses to resist the pressure of the vaults.

The flat, severe entrance facades stretch across the whole church, thus making externally the division of nave and aisles. There is often a central projecting porch, with columns standing on the backs of crouching beasts and a wheeled window above to light the nave.

The gable is characteristically outlined with raking arcades and there are also arcades around the apse under the eaves. The general character becomes less refined, owing to the increased use of stone and brick instead of marble, and ornament shows a departure from classic precedent, and portrays with an element of the grotesque, the rough outdoor life of invaders from the North.

There were many baptisteries, usually octagonal or circular, which is connected to the cathedral by an atrium similar to the famous atrium at St. Ambrogio, Milan. Projecting porches, which were preferred to recessed doorways, are bold arched structure often two storeys, flanked by isolated columns on huge semi-grotesque beasts.



Towers are straight shafts, often detached as at Verona without buttresses or spires. The composition of facades usually relies upon simple pilaster strip decoration running from the ground and ending in small arches under the eaves.

Examples of North Italy

St. Ambrogio, Milan. Founded by the great St. Ambrose in the 4th century, raised on its present plan and partly rebuilt with vault and dome in the 12 century. The plan includes the only existing atrium among Lombard churches, a narthex flanked by towers, vaulted nave and aisles with an octagon over the crossing, triforium gallery, raised choir over the crypt and an apse.

Narthex is a long arcaded entrance porch to a Christian Basilica.

The pulpit which is built over a 6th century Sarcophagus consists of an arcade with characteristic Lombard ornamentation of carved birds and animals.

Pulpit is an elevated enclosed stand in a church in which the preacher stands.

St. Zeno Maggiore (Verona). Has a faade which is stern in its simplicity. The fine projecting porch has two free-standing columns, which rest on the backs of crouching beasts and support a semi-circular vault, over which is a gabled roof. Above is a great wheel window which lights the nave, and the whole facade is relieved by pilaster strips connected by corbel tables under the slopes of the centre gable and side roofs. The interior has a nave arcade of compound piers with uncarved capitals, and the nave shaft is carried up as if to support a vault. Intermediate columns with carved capitals support semi-circular arches, surmounted by a wall banded in red brick and stone. There is no triforium, but a clear-storey and above this is a wooden ceiling of trefoil form. The choir 2.1 m. above the Nave floor has a high pointed 14th century vault and an apse, and beneath is the crypt, in seven aisles, with the shrine of St. Zeno. The campanile is detached and has not buttresses, & is of alternate courses of marble & brick terminating in open arcades to the bell chamber angled pinnacles & a high-pitched roof.

Baptisteries, a special feature of Italian Architecture and represent a period of Christianity when the baptismal rite was carried out only three times a year. Easter, Pentecost and the Epiphany; and therefore required a large and separate building. This contains a baptismal font. Usually octagonal and has a projecting porch and the usual pilaster strips, corbel tables and arcading.

Campanili or bell towers are product of the period of generally stand alone. They are often civic monuments rather than integral parts of churches, and were symbols of power, and served also as watch towers. They are square in plan without the projecting buttresses & design is generally simple, broken only by windows which light the internal staircase or sloping way.

c. South Italy and Sicily. The changing architectural character can be traced through Byzantine, Moslem and Norman Rule, and each successive period carried with it something from the past. Byzantine influence is evident in the mosaic decoration of interiors and predominates in the plans of such buildings. Moslem influence is especially seen in the application of stripes of colored marbles and in the use of stilted pointed arches.

In South Italy domes rather than vaults were adopted, but timber roofs were the rule in Sicily under Moslem influence and had stalactite ceilings, rich in design and color. Lateral walls were occasionally decorated with flat pilaster strips connected horizontally by small arches springing from corbels. Wheel windows are often made of sheets of pierced marble and are highly elaborate.

In South Italy, elaborately modeled bronze doors are characteristically external, while colored mosaics add to the beauty of the interiors of Palermo Churches. Color, in spreading masses of geometric design was the predominant note of internal decoration of South Italian and most especially of Sicilian Churches, while the bronze pilasters clearly indicate the influence of classic tradition.

Examples of South Italy and Sicily

Cefalu Cathedral, 1131 to 1240, founded by Count Roger as a royal pantheon, was served by Augustinian Canons. It is externally the most distinctly Romanesque Church in Sicily, and has a basilican nave with groined aisle vaults, columnar arcades a high transept and a tri-apsidal East end with lateral ribbed vaulting over presbytery and south transept. The two western towers of minaret proportions enclose a columned porch.

Monreale Cathedral. This stands on the heights south-West of Palermo, and is the most splendid of all the monuments erected under Norman Rule in Sicily. The plan is basilican in its western part and quasi-Byzantine inn its Eastern part, with a choir raised above the nave and with eastern apses.

The nave columns have capitals of Byzantine form with dosseret-block encrusted with mosaic to support pointed arches. And in the aisles there are pointed windows without tracery. The walls are covered with mosaics in gold and color, representing scenes from Biblical History with a figure of Christ in the apse, framed in arabesques; while a high dado of white marble slabs is bordered by inlaid patterns in colored porphyries. The open timber roofs, intricate in design, are brightly painted in Moslem style. The interior is solemn and grand, an effect produced by the seventy of the design, enhanced by the colored decoration. The low oblong central lantern & the antique bronze doors add beauty & distinction to this famous church.



Romanesque Architecture in France: 9th to 12th Century

Geographical

France has great natural highways along the valleys of the Rhone, Saone, Seine and Garrone which connect the Mediterranean with the Atlantic Ocean and the English Channel. Roman civilization has spread through France along the historic highway of the fertile Rhone Valley.

Geological

France has an abundance of good stone, easily quarried and freely used for all types of buildings. In the North the fine-grained Caen Stone was available throughout Normandy. In the volcanic district of Auvergne, the colored pumice and tufa were not only used for walls and inlaid decoration, but were so light in weight that they were also employed in large blocks for the solid stone vaulted roofs peculiar to the district.

Climatic

The climatic variations between North and South regulate door and window openings, which decreases in sizes towards the South. The climate also determines the pitch of roofs which, from being steep in the North to throw off snow, become almost flat in sub-tropical South, and these largely control the general architectural style.


Caesars conquest of Gaul (58 to 49 BC) was followed by the systematic Romanization of the country, which had begun with the making of a road system centered upon Lyons, and the development of thriving commercial colonies which adopted the Roman Social System in their independent municipalities. The PAX ROMAN was established, and the early 3rd century, social conditions were very stable; thereafter Roman Administration and Industrial and Commercial Development were progressively undermined by barbarian incursions and by the increasing power of great landowners.

Christianity was first established in the Rhone Valley. Where Lyons contributed martyrs to the cause. The Moslems overrun Southern France but Charles Martel defeated them at Poitiers in 732 and changed the future of Western Europe.

The 11th century was marked by a widespread desire to withdraw from the world and embrace the monastic life; this resulted in the foundation of many religious houses, which gave an impulse to architecture and also fostered art and learning. Religious zeal was not, however, confined with monastic walls, but adventurously mingled with secular ambitions to produce crusades, which began in 1096.


In the South, churches were usually cruciform in plan and frequently had naves covered with barrel vaults whose thrust was taken by half-barrel over vaults aisles in two floors. Buttresses are internal and form the divisions between the chapels which flank the nave, as at Vienne Cathedral. Towers are sometimes detached, like Italian Campanili. Cloisters are treated with the utmost elaboration, and form a special feature in the plan of many churches of this period.

Cloisters (a secluded place) covered passages round an open space, connecting the church to the chapter houses, refectory and other parts of the monastery.

Circular Churches are rare, but the development of the semi-circular east end as an ambulatory, with radiating chapels is common in Southern France. In the North, plans were of basilican type with nave and aisles. The use of high nave vaults changed the setting-out of the bays, which were brought to a square by making one nave vaulting compartment equal to the length of two bays of the aisles until the introduction of the pointed arch solved the problem of vaulting oblong compartments with ribbed vaults.

The South is remarkable for richly decorated church facades and graceful cloisters, and for the use of old Roman Architecture features which seem to have acquired a fresh significance. The development of vaulting progresses, and naves were often covered with barrel vaults whose thrust was resisted by half-barrel vaults over two-storeyed aisles, thus suppressing the clear-storey.

Nave wall arcades of aisle less churches are semi-circular, with moldings in recesses or orders, while cloister arcades are elaborated with coupled columns in the depth of the walls and with carved capitals which support the semi-circular arches of the narrow bays, which were left unglazed as in Italy.

Southern climatic conditions required that roofs need only below pitch, but other factors entered into the nature of their construction; for in the volcanic district of Auvergne the light nature of the stones resulted in stone-covered vaults. While in Aquitaine, Eastern Mediterranean influences promoted the use of domical construction, as at Angouleme.

Piers were derived from the Roman square pier, wire attached columns to which were added hook shafts, and on the nave side the half-round shafts were carried up to the springing of the vaults. In the North, where remains were less abundant there was greater freedom a new style, and western facades of churches, especially in Normandy, are distinguished by the introduction of two flanking towers, while plain massive side walls with flat buttresses emphasize the richness of the facades.



The gradual change to the Gothic System was promoted by repeated attempts to cover oblong compartments with rib and panel vaults, a problem which was eventually solved by the introduction of the pointed arch.

The solution too many problems which had faced the Romanesque designers were found in the building of the choir of Abbey of St. Denis near Paris, where the ribbed vault, pointed arch and flying buttresses are successfully combined.

Nave arcades are spanned by semi-circular arches which are repeated in the deep triforia, imposing western doorways with sculptured tympana were the forerunners of the magnificent sculptured entrances of the Gothic period.

Cylindrical piers were frequent, surmounted with carved capitals of Corinthianesque type and square abacus from which the vaulting shafts start awkwardly. Moldings executed in stone are coarser than those in the marble of Italy. Capitals and bases are either rough imitations of the old Roman Corinthian type.

In the North, the jambs are formed in receding planes, with recesses filled with nook shafts fluted or carved with zigzag ornament. Capitals are frequently cubiform blocks, sometimes carved with animal subjects. Corbel tables of great richness, supported by grotesquely carved heads form the wall.

Facades of churches have elaborate carved ornament representing foliage, or figures of men and animals. Capitals of columns on the ground floor are often continued as a rich, broad frieze across the building. The diaper work in the spandrels of arches is supposed to be an imitation in carving of the color-pattern work or stuff draperies that originally occupied the same position, while the period is rich in carving of zigzags, rosettes and billets. Carved timpana, dealing with Biblical subjects are frequently of considerable distinction.

Examples

Ecclesiastical Architecture

o St. Sernin, Toulouse, is cruciform with nave, double aisle and transepts. The nave has round-arched barrel vaults, with plain square ribs, supporting the roofing slab direct, and the high triforium chamber has external windows which light the nave, for there is no clear-storey.

o St. Madeleine, Vezelay in Burgundy has a most remarkable narthex with nave and aisles crowned by one of the earliest pointed cross vaults in France. This leads into the church, which also has nave and aisles, the transepts, choir and chevet being completed in 1170. The nave has no triforium, but a clear-storey with small windows between the immense transverse arches of the highly domical groined intersecting vaults.

The central portal with two square-headed doorways, separated by a large semi-circular arch containing a relief of the last judgment left and right are side portals, and in the upper part of the faade is a large five-light window richly sculptured and flanked by towers, that in the left rising only to the height of the nave.

Secular Architecture

o Fortified Towns, Bridges, Castles and Houses

Romanesque Architecture in Central Europe: 9th to 12th Century

Geographical

What is now known as Germany was through many centuries a conglomeration, first of various tribes fighting amongst themselves, and then of various independent state, principalities and powers occupying the great central district of Europe. Roman civilization spread North-West along the fertile Rhineland and into Saxony.

Geological

Stone from the mountains along the Rhine Valley was the material used for buildings in this district. Along the Baltic shores and in Central and Southern Germany there was an ample supply of timber. As there was no stone or timber in the plains of the North, brick was used almost exclusively in the district East of the Elber, and the style consequently differs from that of other districts.

Climatic

The average temperature of Central Germany is much the same as in Southern England, but in summer is higher and in winter lower. Roman influence was such that even the northern climate did not exert its full influence on building. Nevertheless there was a distinct tendency to large windows and to steep roofs to throw off snow.


Under the influence of Rome Christianity took root in Southern Germany and in the Rhineland, while the rest of the country remained pagan. As early as the 6th century the Bishop of Trier and Cologne were conspicuous in promoting church building, of which evidences can still be traced.



Charlemagne, the first Frankish King who became Roman Emperor, was crowned in 800 at Rome by the Pope, and ruled over the Franks, which included Central Germany and Northern France. He restored civilization in a great measure to Western Europe and was a patron of architecture. He forced the people of Saxony to embrace Christianity, and this resulted in the erection of a number of circular baptisteries, as the conversion of the tribes made a great demand for the baptismal rite.

The social development of these districts was much the same as in Europe generally; feudal lords were intolerant of King Authority and oppressive towards the people, who became freemen or fill back as serfs, according as kings and cities prevailed against feudal tyranny.


Romanesque architecture in Central Europe exhibits a continuous combination of Carolingian tradition and Lombard influence. The significant structural developments in the high Romanesque of Burgundy, Normandy, were followed in Germany with reluctance, however, and pointed arcades and ribbed vaults were made only a late appearance.

In monastic churches particularly, the principal features of the Carolingian planning survived strongly. They include a choir at the west end, the Nuns choir, or winter choir, often accommodate in Western apse but occasionally provided in a square west end with either transept or tribune. This western choir was commonly built over a crypt in the manner of Lombardic high choir.

Crypt, a space entirely or partly under a building; in churches generally beneath the chancel and used for burial in early times.

A distinctive characteristic of the architecture of the lower Rhineland, and of the valleys of the Moselle and Main, during the later 11th and 12th centuries; is a three-apse plan of trefoil form. This appears to be an idea imported from Early Christian Lombardy.

In the Rhineland the semi-circular cross-vaults of the nave is of a domical nature, owing to the use of semi-circular ribs, which rise to a greater height over the diagonal of the compartment. The system of including two bays of the aisle in one nave vaulting compartment was generally adopted. Timber roofs were also employed for naves with large spans. Square towers divided into floors by molded courses, frequently terminate in four gables with hipped rafters rising from the apex of each, and the roofing planes intersect at these rafters and thus form a pyramidal or helm roof with four diamond-shaped sides meeting at the apex.

Helm roof, type of roof in which four faces rest diagonally between the gables and converge at the top.

Polygonal towers have similar roofs, but with valet between the gables. The plain wall surface is relieved by pilaster strips, connected horizontally at different stages by range of arches on corbels which, owing to the smallness of scale, have the appearance of molded string courses.

Doorways are frequently in the side aisles instead of in the west front or transepts, and have recesses with nook shafts. Windows are usually single but occasionally grouped and sometimes have a mid-wall shaft.

In nave arcades square piers with attached half-columns were usual, though sometimes varied by the alternation of compound piers with attached half-columns were usual, though capitals bold in execution and well designed. The shaft and capitals in doorways were frequently elaborately carved with figures of men, birds and animals.

There is a general absence of moldings in nave arcades. When these occur, they are as a rule of indifferent design, and those of capitals and bases take a distinctive form intermediate between Roman and Gothic. Internally, the flat wall surfaces may have been painted originally, but the general effect today is extremely bare. Characteristic carving in bands was employed and in the north, lines of colored bricks were used externally.

Examples

Aix-la-chapelle (Aachen) Cathedral. Built by the Emperor Charlemagne as his tomb-house. The entrance, flanked by staircase turrets, leads into a polygon of sixteen sides, 32 m. in diameter. Every two angle of this polygon converge to one pier & thus form an internal octagon, the eight piers of which support a dome 14.5 m in diameter, rising above the two-storey surrounding aisles.

The Church of the Apostles, Cologne, is one of the series of trefoil churches in that city. The plan forms a broad nave, aisles half of its width, western transepts, and with a triapsidal choir while over the crossing a low octagonal tower gives dignity to the effective grouping.

The entrance is by a northern porch and there are no great western portals as in France, the west end being occupied by a tower flanked by stair turrets, crowned with a typical Rhenish roof.

Worms Cathedral. The plan is apsidal at both ends, with eastern and western octagons, while one vaulting bay of the nave corresponds with two of the aisles and cross-vaults are employed in both cases.

Turn circular towers containing stairs flank the eastern and western apses, and the crossing of the nave and transept is covered with a low octagonal tower, crowned with a pointed roof. The entrances are in the aisles. The lateral facades have circular-headed windows, between the characteristic flat pilaster strips.



Romanesque Architecture in Spain, Portugal and the Holy Land

Geographical

Spain and Portugal

The Iberian Peninsula is divided into distinct natural regions by the principal mountain ranges which cross it from East to West, enclosing high bare plateau lands. In the middle ages, the natural regions provided boundaries for rival races and kingdoms. Portugal is divided from Spain by the western limits of these high table lands and by the steep gorges of four great rivers. French influence was dominant in the North, but Moorish influence in the South persisted until 1492 in the emirate of Granada, centered on a fertile plain surrounded by high ranges.

The Holy Land

The most influential geographical characteristic of the Latin Kingdom of the crusaders was its shape. From North to South it included the country of Edessa, the principality of Antioch. The country of Tripoli and the Kingdom of Jerusalem and this whole territory was nearly 88 km long, but generally very narrow between the Mediterranean Coast and the Eastern frontier with the semi-desert.

Geological

Spain and Portugal

The peninsula itself is a great rock massif. Natural resources in building stone included granite in the North; limestone in the South and the Ebro basin, red sandstone in the Pyrenees and Andaluca, and both eruptive rock and semi-marbles everywhere, which is used for rubble walling with brick binding courses and quoins, which was used under Moorish influence. There are few forests in Spain and so timber suitable for building is conspicuously absent.

The Holy Land

Here stone materials of eminent suitability for great castles and small churches were abundant, though timber was not as plentiful as in those parts of Europe from which the crusader builder had come.

Climatic

Spain and Portugal

There are four chief varieties of climate. In the provinces along the North and Northwest sea coast, the climate is mild, equable and rainy. In the great central table-land and the basin of the Ebro, the climate is of great extremes of temperature. The plains of the Castile are swept by winds in winter and are torrid in summer. The middle climate along the Mediterranean is moderate and the Southern in Andaluca is sub-tropical, with the greatest heat in Cordoba.

The Holy Land

Climatic conditions vary from the harsh and semi-desert of the South and the Eastern fringes, through the oppressive summer of the Jordan valley to the rocky highlands of Syria which are under snow for much of the year. Rainfall is generally concentrated in the late winter months, but is then usually considerable.


Spain and Portugal

The Moorish incursions in South-West Europe were brought to an end by Charles Martel at Poitiers in 732, and subsequent medieval Spanish history is dominated by successive extensions of Christian influence and the regaining of territory until the very end of the 15th century.

Spain has connection with France and also with England through medieval marriages; with Italy through papal supervision and the quarrels with the Angevins in Naples and Sicily, and with the Moors from Africa. All these links affected in varying degrees the architecture in the peninsula. The evidence of Moorish influence appears in curious construction and exuberant detail.

As to social conditions in Spain, only a small proportion of the population, including citizens of chartered towns were free; under the system of land tenure the peasants were oppressed throughout the middle ages. Social life in pain was dominated by the Grandess and the clergy; churches and monasteries are the chief architectural monuments, while in domestic architecture there is little importance except the houses of the nobility.

Christianity has reached the Iberian Peninsula in the 2nd century and flourished for two hundred years. The constant warfare waged against the Moors, which was religious even more than racial, gave a certain unity to the Christian states of the Peninsula. Throughout the medieval period, the Catholic Church was the strongest and most constant unifying force in the struggle against the Moors, and it thus obtained great temporal power and possessions. This fact and the Spanish taste for dramatic ceremonial



and ritual, determined the planning cathedrals and churches with their great sanctuaries and enormous chapels of the noble families.

The Holy Land

The Latin Kingdom in the Holy Land was established as a direct consequence of the reaction in Christian Europe following the call by Pope Urban II in 1905 to the first crusade. The Frankish fighting men were in a minority even in their own garrisons, and some of the characteristics of the magnificent military architecture resulted from the necessity for security as much against internal revolt as against external threat. The prosecution of the Holy War through the 12th century produced buildings not only for military value and wide influence upon later castle architecture in Europe.

It is worth emphasizing that the building initiative of the crusades was turned also to the necessary religious functions, and in many cases these were combined; the templars hospice building in Palestine usually included a fortified church. The grear inland castles almost invariably had a chapel, and tortosa has a cathedral church. Churches were built, or more usually adapted from existing buildings, in many of the Holy Places. The centers of administration, however, and the communications network, were based upon the castles.


Spain and Portugal

The tangible remains of this period are scarce, but are sufficient to show that Visigothic art provided a link between Eastern and Western Mediterranean cultures long before the Moorish influences were introduced. Some features of church design of this period anticipated the distinctive characteristics of mature Spanish Romanesque architecture. The most important of these was the horseshoe arch.

Church planning, was carried, and includes instances of both Basilican and Greek-Cross forms, with chapels attached to the Eastern arm as prothesis and diaconicon. Decorative devices include cable moldings and some Syrian motifs (rosettes, circumscribed stars).

Diaconicon, the vestry of Early Christian Church.

Prothesis that part of a church where the credence table stands.

By about 780, a national school of church of architecture, painting and sculptures had developed and in the 9 th and 10th centuries achieved a stature, comparable with contemporary Lombardy or Saxon England. The threat of the Norse raiders led to the very introduction in Asturian Church and Court Architecture of barrel vaulting as a protection against fire. The most typical plan form for these Asturian Churches is basilican, with a beina, or lateral chapel projections providing a kind of transept.

Churches built for Christian communities under tolerant Moslem control were based principally upon mosque traditions. In Adora and Catalonia, Mozarabic Architecture was succeeded after the middle years of the 10th century by a truly continental Romanesque style created in Lombardy soon after 800.

An incidental but significant phase of Romanesque development in Spain was provided by church buildings in parts of Castile and Aragon newly recovered to Christian rule. Most of the products of this Mude jar movement are simple churches without aisles, having sanctuary barrel vaults, timber ceiling, and some form of eastern apse, usually polygonal in plan. Most of the churches were built in brick.

The finest achievement of the Spanish High Romanesque is the great church which marked the goal of the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. IT has a long nave often bays with groined-vaulted aisles, a gallery with half barrel vault and no clear-storey. The high vault is a barrel with transverse arches, which is returned through the wide transepts, together with heavy square piers with attached shafts, the inner ones carried up through the gallery to carry the vault arches.

Spain is well endowed with medieval military architecture; grand castles are particularly numerous in Castle. The earliest castles and town walls occur in Andalusia and are related to Moorish work in Morocco. The finest of Romanesque castles in Spain is at Loarre in Aragon. It incorporates an important Augustinian Church.

The city walls of Avila in central castle, are of granite, are splendidly preserved, and constitute one of the most distinguished works of military architecture in Europe.

Examples of Spain and Portugal

Religious Buildings

o St. Maria Ripolli, is the finest of the 11th century early Romanesque churches. It has a double aisled Basilican Nave of seven bays and the outer arcades alternate to produce double bays in the aisles, in the Lombardic manner. The bold transepts are modeled on the basilican church bema, and there are seven eastern apses. Externally the church portrays



many of the Lombardic features which accompany its formal derivation from Italian models. These included arcaded apse galleries, blind wall arcading and pilaster strips, and gable galleries on the west front.

o St. Tirso, Sahagun one of the earliest brick Mudejar Churches, has much of the 11th century of Catalan Romanesque, though with Moorish overtones, such as the horseshoe-headed blind arcading to the apses, set in rectangular panels.

o La Lugareja, Arevalo 13th century is the finest example of Mudejar work in brick. A Cistercian church, it has many Lombardic devices, and a bold central tower enclosing a lantern cupola on pendentives.

o St. Martin de Fromista is the only complete example of the Spanish pilgrimage style, with a four-bay nave, shallow transept, and three paralle apses. It has barrel vaults throughout, but it approaches hall church form, the aisle vault springing nearly at the level of that of the high vaults, so that there is no clear-storey. There is a tall octagonal lantern at the crossing.

o Monastery of Poblet, in Catalonia was founded in 1151, and the church was built between 1180 and 1196, with a chevet having five radiating chapels, with absidoles attached to the transepts. The aisles have four-part vaults throughout, but nave and transepts is barrel vaulted.

Absidole or Absidoles, a small apsidal chapel one projecting from an apse.

Military Buildings

o Castle. The finest Romanesque castle in Spain is at Loarre, a complex of circular towers and curtain wall incorporating a church of Augustinian Canons, situated on a spire overlooking the Gallego Valley.

o City Walls. The town defenses at Avila, in Castile include a curtain wall 2.5 km. long with 86 identical circular towers, built in granite by Raymond of Burgundy, largely in a French masonry manner. There are ten gates, each formed by an arched opening between two adjoining towers.

Holy Land

Military Buildings. The Castles of the Crusaders were of three kinds, each having a specific function:

1. Pilgrim Forts. Located and designed to secure the routes from coastal ports to Jerusalem. They were generally designed on a Byzantine pattern derived from the ancient Roman castrum or legionary fort.

2. Coastal Fortifications. The Levantine coastal ports were fortified to secure the sea links with the west. They took the form either of a bastide town, a civil settlement under the protection of a castle.

3. Strategic Inland Castles. The principal function is to protect the coast road. A large part of the strategic strength of the crusaders castle lay in an elaborate communication between them by means of carrier pigeon and visual signaling.

The general form of the large castles makes it possible to divide them into two main types.

a. First Type. Castles are those of the 12th century when the main strategic process was one of the hopeful expansions, and the purpose of the fortifications was primarily offensive. Keep and donjon, is the stronghold of a medieval usually in the form of a massive tower and a place of residence, especially in times of siege. Fosse - foss, a moat or a ditch.

b. Second Type. Castles belongs mostly to the period of nearly 100 years after Hattin, and shows the need for increasing defensive strength in place of depleted manpower. Talus, the slope as inclination of any work, or a coarse rock fragments, mixed with soil at the foot of a cliff. Glacis, a sloped embankment in front of a fortification so raised to bring an advancing enemy into the most direct line of fire. Bent Entrance, an arrangement of two gate-ways not in line so that it is necessary to make a sharp turn to pass through the second, for privacy in houses or temples. For security in fortifications.

Examples

The Chateau de Mer, Sidon, Lebanon is the best surviving example of coastal crusader castle, separated from his dependent township by a sea dike crossed only by a later causeway.

Saone at the north end of the Gebel Alawi, was built on a site previously fortified by the Greeks in Byzantine fashion, with a thin outer curtain wall punctuated with shallow towers, and a keep commanding the most vulnerable part of the curtain.

Allure, an alley, walk or passage. A gallery behind a parapet.

The Krak of the Knights. The best preserved and most wholly admirable castles in the world, is the eastern most of a chain of 5 castles located so as to secure the Horns gap; the Krak was in visual signal communication with Akkar, the north end of the Litani Valley. The castle stands upon a Southern spur of the Gebel Alawi.



The most remarkable single feature of the inner castle is the colossal glacis of the west and south sides, which the Arabs call the mountain, rising formidably above the great cistern and the outer ward, more than 25 m. thick at the base.

Parapet the portion of the wall above the roof gutter or balconies sometimes battlemented.

Battlement parapet having a series of indentations or embrasures, between which are raised portions known as merlons.

Merlons upstanding part of an embattled parapet, between two cre-nelles or embrasure openings.

Machicolations projecting wall or parapet allowing floor openings, through which molten lead, pitch, stones, were dropped on an enemy below

Moat a broad deep trench surrounding the ramparts of a town or fortress usually filled with water.

Drawbridge at the entrance of a fortification, a bridge over the moat or ditch, hinged and provided with a raising and lowering mechanism so as to hinder or permit passage.

Portcullis a defensive grating, of massive iron or timber movable, vertically in retaining grooves cut in the jambs of a fortified gateway.

Loggia an arcaded or colonnaded structure opens on one or more sides, sometimes with an upper floor.

Religious Buildings. The church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem by its origin and its function is the most sacred in Christendom, and its Holy Places were the final objective of the crusades. It is to be expected, it represents the finest and most ambitious of crusader church architecture, the sources of which can be traced to Provence, Burgundy and Poitov, and to the art of the Santiago pilgrim routes, all over laid with Levantine characteristics.

Examples

St. Anne, Jerusalem which commemorates the site held to be that of the home of the parents of the virgin, and consequently her birth place. It has a typical Benedictine plan. The arches are generally pointed and the central west door is a finely proportioned near-Gothic feature embellished with molding enrichments which anticipate the 13th century dog-tooth.

Romanesque Architecture in British Isles and Scandinavia: 1st to 12th Century

Geographical

In Northern Europe, remote from Rome, development depended largely upon a common concern with sea and river routes. The geographical similarities of the political divisions of Scandinavia gave the whole region a unity which emphasized by the greater ease of sailing across the narrow waters within the region than of crossing the mountains toward the rest of Europe.

Skill in navigation during the middle ages led to the Nordic colonization of Iceland and Greenland and to cultural and commercial contact with Ireland and Britain.

Geological

Geological formation of Great Britain was varied. The English hardwood forests, particularly in the North-Western and South-Eastern countries, provided roof framing material for the more important buildings, and for lesser buildings which were entirely timber-framed. Most of the indigenous building stones contributed to the materials of the more mature military and religious buildings.

Climatic

The generally low northern light tended to encourage the development of ways of producing larger or multiple openings in walls. Massive masonry construction and steeply-pitched roofs, roof pitches were often reduced in order that it should assist in retaining heat within the buildings.


The British Isles

The Roman conquest of Britain was preceded by the landings of Julius Caesar in 55 and 54 B.C. During the military occupation following the Claudian invasion of 43 A.D. progress was made in developing natural resources such as tin, iron and lead; orderly government was ensured by the Roman Legions, and improved methods in agriculture stabilized the society.

Christianity first made its way into Britain during the Roman occupation, but during the years of the Anglo-Saxon settlements, after the middle of the 5th century, church building was of historical importance only in Ireland. The conversion to Christianity of the Anglo-Saxon kings and their people is evidenced by numerous surviving churches, towers and crosses of the 7th and 8th centuries.

In 1042, Edward, son the English Ethelred, acceded to the throne and assured the Norman influence of England before the conquest. He begun in 1045 the building of Westminster Abbey, the church planned in the current Norman Benedictine fashion, and the conventual buildings based largely upon the Cluniac pattern.



The Norman conquest of 1066 linked England to the continent and introduced a fully developed feudal system. Yet all land was held from the king, who established the most efficient and centralized government in Europe. Castles were built to strengthen the position of the conquerors. Towns which grew up around abbeys became trading centers and through their merchant guilds laid the foundations of urban government. Settled government prompted the pursuit of learning.

The crusades gave impetus to the progress of learning and in the foundation of the military orders which influenced some aspects of church-building later in the middle ages.

Scandinavia

The Kingdoms were first in Denmark and Norway, and that by about the year 1000 Sweden was united as part of the Svear Kingdom. The Viking expansion of the 9th century, which included in the early Danish settlement in North East England, the colonization of Normandy and the establishment of the Svear colonies in Latvia, all brought Northern influences to bear European development.

The most distinctive building development of the period in Scandinavia followed the conversion of the Northern races, which was started by the Frankish missionary Angar at Hedeby in Denmark in 826. The Norse Church itself was established from Britain, and Christianity was legally maintained in Norway, Greenland and Iceland by the end of the 10th century.

In 980 the Danish King Harold made his people Christians, English bishops were introduced, and the Empire was spread into England. The earliest Christian Scandinavian buildings those of Frankish missionaries, were Timber-built. Particularly in Norway, development of timber techniques continued into the 13th century. Subsequent building in stones reflected Germany & cluniac influences in Denmark.

The monastic orders played an important part in reinforcing Scandinavian links with Europe and the Benedictine Church Architecture of Denmark and Norway followed very closely much of the custom of the order, through with some cluniac modifications, and in both Denmark and Sweden were established several examples of Cistercian abbeys displaying simple and robust Burgundy characteristic.


The British Isles

a. Roman Period

Examples of mosaic flooring, pottery and sculptures indicate the cave which the Romans bestowed on dwelling houses and public buildings. The characteristics of Roman architecture were so virile that they inevitably influenced subsequent Anglo-Saxon and Romanesque architecture in Britain.

The form of the Christian Church in Britain before the end of the Roman occupation is exemplified at Silchester. This was a small church, with a Basilican plan, built early in the 4th century. It had a western apse.

b. Anglo-Saxon Period

Domestic buildings were largely dependent upon the use of timber, but little evidence remains of methods of construction. The masonry of church buildings from about the middle of the 7th century shows signs of dependence on timber prototypes, as in the long and short work in groins.

c. Norman Period

During the last three decades of the 11th century there was an enormous surge of military and church building centered particularly upon the great Benedictine Abbeys. In greater church architecture, the characteristics directly or indirectly inherited from Cluny were the long nave exemplified in Norwich with 14 bays, St. Albans 13 bays and Winchester at 12 bays.

Examples of British Isles

1. Cathedral Churches

a. The Old Foundation. Served by secular clergy. b. Monastic Foundation. Originally served by regular clergy or monks, and were reconstituted at the Dissolution of the

monasteries as chapters of the secular canons. c. New Foundation. The cathedrals of the new foundation are those to which bishops have been more recently appointed.

2. Monastic Buildings

A representative example of mature largely Romanesque monastic architecture is Fountains Abbey, Yorkshire. The gatehouse led into the outer court; south of this were the guest house and the infirmary of the converse, or lay brethren, and east of it was the cellarium, no less than 90 meters long, comprising storehouses and refectory of these converse on the lower floor, with the dormitory above. Opposite the gatehouse is the comitial church, of which the nave and transepts date from about 1147. The transept known as the Chapel of the Nine Altars was built.

Refectory. It is a hall in a convent, monastery or public secular institution where meals are eaten.



3. Castles

a. Anglo-Saxon Period, there were no castles, as the Forts of burhs built at this time were for community use; privately speaking castles were private strongholds for king or lord, and were an outcome of the feudal system, which did not apply in England until the conquest.

b. Norman Period, there were 1,500 castles in England and 1,200 were founded in the 11th to 12 century. Only a few of the most important had stone keeps from the outset, majority began as Motte and Bailey earthworks. The motte or mound usually was partly natural, partly artificial, its sides steeped by a ditch dug around its base. The flat-topped crest sometimes was broad enough to accommodate a timber dwelling. In other cases it served solely as a citadel, carrying a wooden defense tower, raised on angle posts.

Motte a steep mound of earth surrounded by a ditch and surmounted by a timber stockade and tower; the main feature of a Norman Castle.

Bailey it is the open area with a medieval fortification; the outer wall of a Feudal Castle.

Rampart it is the earthen or masonry defense wall of a fortified site.

Palisade a series of stout poles, pointed on top and driven into the earth, used as a fence or fortification.

Baulks a squared timber used in building construction or a low ridge of earth that makes a boundary line

4. Manor Houses

a. Anglo-Saxon Period. One of the earliest types of dwelling in England was the aisled hall, known well before Roman times. In Anglo-Saxon times it could be on the one hand a palace or mansion or on the other a husbandmans steading, accommodating corn & fodder in the nave, oxen & horses in the aisles and living quarters in the end opposite the entrance.

Manor House the most important house in a country or village neighborhood.

b. Norman Period. Such a few examples as remains are mostly in the South-East. In the majority, stone-built, the domestic accommodation is raised on a first floor, over an undercroft or storage cellar.

Undercroft it is the vaulted basement of a church or secret passage, often wholly or in part below ground level. It is also called a crypt.

Cellar a floor having half or more of its clear height below grade.

Solar a room or apartment on an upper floor, as in Early English dwelling house.

Scandinavia

Truly Romanesque characteristics did not appear in the architecture of Scandinavia until both British and Continental European influences upon church buildings in stone became effective toward the middle of the 11th century. The traditions of ship-building and of timber-built pagan temples supported the development of a distinctive native architecture of which there is ample early evidence.

The most highly developed form of stave church has an inner timber colonnade which contributes to a basilican section with a clear-storey, and a steep scissors-trussed roof.

Medieval dwellings in Scandinavia show a continuous tradition of timber building, particularly in Norway. The customary technique was a form of Lafting making use of logs lapped at their ends. The Swedish version of this combined structure which was common throughout South Scandinavia is known as Ramloftstuga.

Lapped It is a joint formed by placing one piece partly over another and uniting the overlapped portions.

Examples of Scandinavia

1. Religious Buildings

The Stave churches represent a most distinctive indigenous architectural phenomenon of the early middle ages in Scandinavia. A Stave Church is a Scandinavian wooden church with vertical planks forming the walls.

The church has an internal timber colonnade and basilican section. The chancel has an eastern apse of later date, and the upper gables are embellished with carved dragons heads, reminiscent of the figure heads of pagan times. Internal decoration is limited to craved heads as capitals to the main columns and foliated carvings of the bracing timbers above the level of the aisled walls.

Stone-built church architecture in Scandinavia was most profoundly influenced by Norman and Anglo-Saxon Benedictine Fashion. Earlier examples, such as Husaby Church, while reflecting some of the Carolingian characteristic of this tradition, such as the oxial western tower and eastern apse, also adopted some of the Anglo-Saxon features of the 9th and 10th centuries.

The Lund Cathedral was built after 1103 to an enlarged design by Donatus, probably a Lombard Architect. The plan is organized on a double-bay system, possibly modeled upon that of Speyer and incorporates a western tribune and towers begun about 1150 but completed in Lombardic style. Richly decorated capitals, arches and Tympana reflect a continuing Nordic Tradition.



2. Secular Buildings

Early medieval minor domestic architecture in Scandinavia conformed to the strong tradition of timber construction, and little original work survives. The traditional forms themselves are fairly readily discerned, and the constructional techniques were apparently similar in many respects.

Stone-built dwellings followed the continental custom, and must have had much in common with the Norman manor house in England. An example is at Tynnelso. The lower floor is a cross-vaulted undercroft probably used for storage and occasional accommodation of livestock, with a hall and chamber at first floor level.

Gothic Architecture in Central Europe: 13th to 16th Century

Geographical

The former collection of states which became the German Empire was inevitably in geographical touch with the architecture of neighboring countries. The chief influence of German Gothic Architecture came from France and is conspicuous in the Rhine Provinces and Westphalia, notably in Cologne Cathedral and other churches, castles, town halls and domestic buildings along the Rhine.

Geological

The northern plains of Germany provide little building material but brick, which gives a special character to the architecture. In the center and south along the Rhine, excellent stone was found, while timber from the great forests in these regions give individuality to domestic buildings as in wooded districts of England.

Climatic

The climate is without the fierce sun of the south, and therefore permitted large traceried windows, as in England and France, but the snows of severe winters rendered steep roofs a necessary and special characteristic.


Central European History in this period is complicated by the successive rise and fall of imperial and royal dynasties, by the intrigue of princely and ducal houses of the various states to secure kingly power, and by the secular ambition of prince-bishops who combined the intolerance of ecclesiastical with the arrogance of secular tyrants.

Germany was not one, but many states, thus the style of architecture varies with the locality, just as does the constitution of the various states and cities. Trade guilds during this period acquired great importance and built elaborate halls, while freemasons have been credited with much influence in the design and working out of the Gothic style.

The most salient feature, apart from monastic establishments, in the religious life of medieval Germany before the reformation, was the exercise of civil power by prince-bishops, who included in their rank electors of the Holy Roman Empire, and whose principalities were only finally swept away by the European upheaval during the French Revolution.

Ecclesiastical abuses and especially the sale of indulgences led to the revolt against the authority in Rome, until in 1517 Luther published his famous thesis against indulgences. The reformation divided Germany into the Protestant North and Catholic South.

ARCHITECTURAL CHARACTER

The style came from France and was not evolved from German Romanesque, and this method of introduction may be due to the extent to which Romanesque building had been developed in Germany, where a preference for the ponderous Romanesque style had resulted in the adaptation of vaulting to new needs without resorting to the pointed arch and other Gothic features.

In Northern Germany and in the Valley of the Elbe the architecture was carried out in brick and a Lubeck even window mullions and tracery were of brick, and the brick architecture has the character due to the material.

The Hall churches (Dreischiffige Kirchen) are a special characteristic of German Gothic, more particularly in the North, and in these the nave and aisles are approximately the same height, with the consequent absence of triforium and a clear-storey.

Examples

Ecclesiastical. St. Elizabeth, Malburg (1257-83)

Is the typical hall church in which nave and aisles are of equal height and thus there is no triforium or clear-storey. The plan has nave aisles, western entrance between two towers, and apses at the ends of the transepts and sanctuary. The exterior is peculiar in having a continuous external walking way at the level of each stage of windows, carried right through the buttresses.

Secular. Castles were ubiquitous, where the old fortified town still retains in medieval walls with defensive towers.

Town Halls (Rathauser). Regensburg are prominent and impressive buildings and like the town gates in the Baltic provinces are



evidence of the prosperity of those times.

Customs House, Nuremberg 1498. Is remarkable with three storeys in the walls and no less than six storeys in its high roof, finished with a fine traceried gable.

Old Houses. Are characteristic examples of the secular architecture of the period; old houses in Nuremberg, the Kaiserworth in Goslar and the old house in Brunswick.

Domestic Architecture was marked by lofty roofs which frequently had more storeys than the walls, and were provided with dormer windows to make a through current of air for their use as a drying ground for the large monthly wash. The planning of the roof-ridge, either parallel with or at right angles to the street, considerably influenced design.

Thus in Nuremberg, where the ridge is generally parallel with the street, dormer windows are plentiful and party walls are finished off at the roof level with artistic treatment, while at landshut and elsewhere the ridge at right angles to the street result in gables of great variety of design, other with a hoist in the top gable to raise goods from the ground level.

Gothic Architecture in France: 12th to 16th Century

Geographical

France is divided into two parts by the River Loire with the Franks on the North and the Romans on the South architecture were influenced not only by geographical position, but also by racial differences.

Geological

The excellent building stone in France continued as abundance as in the Romanesque period, and that found near Caen aided in the development of the North Gothic Style. In the mountainous district of Auvergne the use of volcanic stone gave a rich chromatic appearance to the buildings; while

Documents

Evaluation of Architectural Design