Classical Architecture // Early Christian // Romanesque (Architecture Style)
4:05 AMClassical Architecture // Early Christian // Romanesque (Architecture Style)
Region: Europe
Period: Mid eleventh to mid twelfth century
Characteristics:
- West towers
- Round arch; Apses
- Barrel vault
- Thick piers and columns
- Severity
What fundamentally differentiates
Romanesque – literally meaning
‘resembling Roman’ – from the
architecture of the preceding period
is its spatial organization.
From the
late tenth century a sense of spatial
coherence and unity began to emerge
through planning, for example in the
second abbey at Cluny (consecrated in
981) and the slightly later church of
St. Michael at Hildesheim.
In contrast
to the monotony of the basilican plan,
a distinct rhythm is established in
these churches through the repetitive
spacing of piers and columns, which is
punctuated by the crossing, a defining
feature of the Romanesque.
The Normans were central to both
the development and the spread of
these new ideas. The key innovation in
cathedral design, which the Normans
introduced to England following their
victory at the Battle of Hastings in 1066
and subsequent conquest, was the bay.
Internal elevations were composed of
stacked arcades of round arches resting
on massive piers, which were tied
together by subsidiary vertical shafts that
served to defi ne bays both as individual
entities and part of a collective whole.
Many early Romanesque cathedrals had
flat ceilings, although tunnel vaults were
also fairly common across Europe during
the early twelfth century. Groin vaults
had been invented by the Romans, but they were rarely used after the decline
of the Roman Empire because of their
geometrical complexity.
However, the
masons at Durham Cathedral in Englandfelt confi dent enough to use them for
the nave, prefiguring the Gothic in form, if not in structure.
Theapplied ribs of the groin vault tie the
opposing elevations together, creating
a coherent spatial relationship.
The exteriors of early Christian
and Byzantine churches were often left
bare and unarticulated. In Romanesquearchitecture the exterior received far
more attention.
Increasingly, towers
marked the intersection of the nave andthe transept arms. However, the greatestexterior innovation is undoubtedly
the twin-towered west front, seen, for
example, in the Norman abbeys of La
Trinité (begun ca. 1062) and St. Étienne
(begun ca. 1067), both in Caen (though
they are not the earliest examples).
Different regions created their
own versions of Romanesque as the
style spread across Europe, often via
pilgrimage routes; the Romanesque
cathedral at Santiago de Compostela
in Spain was an important destination
for pilgrims. With the advent of the
Crusades at the end of the eleventh
century, the increasing interchange
of architectural ideas would see
Romanesque soon make way for
the Gothic.
West towers
 |
| St. Trinité, Caen, Normandy, France, begun ca. 1067 |
Round arch
 |
| Nave, Ely Cathedral, Cambridgeshire, twelfth century |
Round arch Ancient Roman architecture made extensive and systematic use of the round arch, which was an essential element of some of its greatest achievements. Its use never died out during the intervening centuries, but it was only in Romanesque architecture that the possibilities of the round-arch arcade in both a structural and a spatial sense were once again exploited to the full.
Apses
 |
| Speyer Cathedral, Speyer, Germany, 1024–61 |
Apses The east end of an early Christian basilican church usually terminated with an apse – a semicircular recession in which the altar was placed. Apses are similarly a standard feature of Romanesque church architecture, appearing not only at the east end but also at the transept arms or even at the west end.
Barrel vault
 |
| St. Sernin, Toulouse, France, begun ca. 1080 |
Barrel vault
While early Christian churches and
cathedrals had timber roofs, barrel vaults
were frequently used in Romanesque
architecture. Formed by the extrusion of
a single semicircular arch along an axis,
barrel vaults require thick supporting
walls. Thus they contribute indirectly to
the apparent heaviness of the Romanesque
in contrast to the Gothic.
Thick piers
 |
| Durham Cathedral, County Durham, England, 1093–1133 |
Thick piers and columns Unlike the pointed arch of the later Gothic, the Romanesque round arch required the support of massive piers or columns. Monolithic piers were usually formed from an ashlar shell fi lled with rubble masonry. Columns were often composed of multiple shafts, which, as well as providing support, visually linked lower and upper arcade levels and helped defi ne individual bays.
Severity
 |
| St. Front, Périgueux, France, early twelfth century |
Severity Romanesque architecture can be severe in its austere forms and geometric intensity, features that are especially characteristic of its Norman iterations. The cathedral of St. Front, originally an abbey, appears to be based on St. Mark’s Basilica. Yet rather than being covered in mosaics, its pendentive domes are left unadorned, giving the interior an architectural force quite unlike that of its Venetian model.
Book Reference :
Architectural Styles A Visual Guide by Owen Hopkins
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