Art historians in the early nineteenth century, following the natural sciences in an effort to classify their field of inquiry, coined the term “Romanesque” to encompass the western European artistic production, especially architecture, of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The study of medieval art began in earnest in the decades following the iconoclasm of the French Revolution. Glowing illuminations often decorated the pages of these books and the most eminent among them were adorned with sumptuous bindings (Book Cover with Byzantine Icon of the Crucifixion, 17.190.134). The new monasteries became repositories of knowledge: in addition to the Bible, the liturgical texts, and the writings of the Latin and Greek Church Fathers, their scriptoria copied the works of classical philosophers and theoreticians, as well as Latin translations of Arabic treatises on mathematics and medicine. ![]() Rich textiles and precious objects in gold and silver, such as chalices and reliquaries, were produced in increasing numbers to meet the needs of the liturgy and the cult of the saints. Frescoes were applied to the vaults and walls of churches (Temptation of Christ, San Baudelio de Berlanga, 61.248). Monumental doors, baptismal fonts, and candleholders, frequently decorated with scenes from biblical history, were cast in bronze, attesting to the prowess of metalworkers. For the first time since the fall of the Roman empire, monumental sculpture covered church facades, doorways, and capitals ( Last Judgment, Tympanum, Beaulieu-sur-Dordogne Standing Prophet, Moissac). Adapting the plan of the Roman basilica with a nave, lateral aisles, and apse, these churches typically have a transept crossing the nave, and churches on the pilgrimage road included an ambulatory (a gallery allowing the faithful to walk around the sanctuary) and a series of radiating chapels for several priests to say Mass concurrently. Stone churches of hitherto unknown proportions were erected to accommodate ever-larger numbers of priests and monks, and the growing crowds of pilgrims who came to worship the relics of the saints ( Sainte-Foy at Conques). Writing in the early eleventh century, the Burgundian historian Radulfus Glaber described a “white mantle of churches” rising over “all the earth.” Stimulated by economic prosperity, relative political stability, and an increase in population, this building boom continued over the next two centuries. ![]() New orders were founded, such as the Cistercian, Cluniac, and Carthusian, and monasteries were established throughout Europe. The expansion of monasticism was the main force behind the unprecedented artistic and cultural activity of the eleventh and twelfth century.
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