History of ROMANESQUE ART – short summary

The Romanesque art It is considered the first unified artistic style within Western European culture after the fall of the Roman Empire. Thus, it is the first style that can be described as international, having France and Italy as points of diffusion and radiating from there to Spain, Germany, England and the rest of the territories located on the continent European.

In this lesson of unPROFESOR.com we offer you a summary of the Romanesque art history, a really exciting and unique period in the History of Art.

Before learning about the history of Romanesque art, it is important that we stop to learn about the definition and characteristics of Romanesque art.

The term Romanesque was established by the French archaeologist Charles deGerville (1768-1853) in the year 1818 to name all the artistic manifestations that took place in Western Europe between the centuries VIII to XII, even up to 1250 in some areas.

Being an art that was considered derived from roman art and, just as the languages ​​they spoke were called Romance or Romance, the art of the time received the same name. Gerville used the term to refer especially to architecture, since his constructions were more like the

opus romanum.

Thus, the RAE defines the Romanesque as an architectural style characterized by the use of semicircular arches, barrel vaults, free-standing columns and robust moldings.

We begin to know the history of Romanesque art, indicating that it was a type of art that spread throughout Europe between the 11th, 12th and part of the 13th centuries. The styles prior to the Romanesque are called pre-Romanesque art and among them are:

• The visigothic art, Asturian and Mozarabic arte, developed in Spain between the 7th and 11th centuries
• The carolingian art, developed in central Europe during the 9th century.
• And the otonic art, developed in 10th-century Germany.

Main phases of Romanesque art

The chronological period of the Romanesque is divided into three phases:

• First Romanesque (1000-1075). This first phase is still poor and wooden decks are used in naves and the oven vault for the apses.
• Full Romanesque (1075-1150). The temples are enlarged to respond to the new and more complex liturgical ceremony. In the churches appear the ambulatories, the tribunes and the transepts. The barrel vault and the domes.
• Late Romanesque (second half of the 13th century). It is the moment in which the cathedrals are erected in Europe and that already announce the Gothic.

We are going to make a contextualization of the history of Romanesque art to better understand its influences and its moment.

Romanesque is an art fully religious and feudal that arose in a Europe that was beginning to stabilize thanks to the cessation of the barbarian invasions, the strengthening of the Church as one of the great institutions of religious, political and Social. The feudalism was the system of economic, political and social organization in which this art emerged, entering into crisis and giving way to the Gothic with the political crises of the 12th and 13th centuries, at which time the power of the King was strengthened to the detriment of that of the lords feudal

In addition, at this time the horror of the year thousand. An ancient terror that consisted of a general fear that the end of the world would come when the year 1000 arrived. This fear greatly influenced Romanesque art, an art of the cultural elites with which it was a question of instilling fear before God and maintaining a deeply hierarchical social structure.

Thus, Romanesque art spread thanks to the monastic orders, especially the Benedictine order of Cluny, the Cluniacs. From there arose the cult of relics and the model of pilgrimage churches. To this was added the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, the Holy Places of Jerusalem and the catacombs of Rome. A phenomenon that combined commercial interest with religious worship of relics, as well as being points of exchange of ideas and culture.

Finally, The Crusades they also contributed to the development of Romanesque art by bringing with them new architectural knowledge from the East.