25. Romanesque - Aerial view of Sainte-Foy, Conques, Auvergne, France. c. 1050-1120.
26. Vezelay, exterior tympanum (Mission of the Apostles) Sculpture used to teach religion to people since most could not read. This type of sculpture is called architectonic since it is part of the architecture.
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29. There are several features that Characterize Gothic construction. There is an overall feeling of verticality as architects tried to make the interiors as high as possible, as if reaching toward heaven. Chartres Cathedral
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31. Tympanum, lintel, and archivolts of the central portal, west façade, Chartres Cathedral, c. 1145-1170 .
41. Fan Vaulting broke the vaulting into many umbrella spokes and also lightened the pressure of the ceiling
42. Gargoyles: a protecting ornament on a building carved in the shape of a fantastic animal or grotesque creature; meant to look like spirits fleeing or being driven from the holy building, could also have been to entice non-believers to enter the cathedral.
52. Vishnu Dreaming the Universe or Vishnu Sleeping on Ananta , relief panel, south side of Temple of Vishnu, Deogarh, Uttar Pradesh, India, early 6th century.
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Editor's Notes
The medieval Church was enormously wealthy. Over the centuries, Christians had donated to Christendom so many thousands of acres of land that, by the end of the 12 century, the Catholic Church was the largest single land holder in western Europe.
Against the rising tide of European monarchies, the papacy took measures to ensure its independence and its dominance.
Burned at the stake – being the preferred punishment for female heretics. The accused were deprived of legal counsel and were usually tried in secret. Inquisitors might use physical torture to obtain confession, for the Church considered injury to the body preferable to the eternal damnaiton of the soul.
The seven sacraments – touched every significant phase of human life; At birth, baptism purified the recipient of original Sin; confirmation admitted the baptized to full church privileges; ordination invested those entering the clergy with priestly authority; matrimony blessed the union of man and woman; penance acknowledged repentance of sins and offered absolution; Eucharist – the central and most important of the sacraments – joined human beings to God by means of the body and blood of Jesus; and finally , just prior to death, extreme unction provided final absolution from sin. By way of the sacraments, the Church participated in virtually every major aspect of the individual’s life, enforcing a set of values that determined the collective spirituality of Christendom.
Entering a Benedictine convent at the age of 8, she went on to become its abbess, A scholar of both Latin and her native German, she wrote three visionary tracts, treatises on natural science, medicine, and the treatment of disease an allegorical dialogue between the vices and the virtues, and a cycle of 77 songs arranged for devotional performance. She is one of the first great Christian mystics, Her works on such topics as the nature of the universe, the meaning of Scripture, and the destiny of the Christian soul are eloquent and original. In her landmark treatise Scivias, short Scito vias domini (know the Ways of the Lord) She recounts ecstatic visions filled with vivid images that have come to her in a “voice from Heaven”. She didn’t create the artwork for her book, but she designed how they would look.
Sufism placed emphasis on visionary experience and the intensification of physical sensation through music, poetry, and dance, Religious rituals featuring whirling dancers known as “dervishes” transported the pious to a state ecstasy.
Italian, father nicknamed him “Francesco”. Legends written after his death credit him with numerous miracles and cures. One of the most popular legends related that toward the end of his life, during a period of withdrawal and fasting, his spiritual identity with Jesus was confirmed by his reception of the stigmata – the physical marks of the Cruscifixion.
Medieval towns lured framers and artisans to buy freedom from the lord of the manor – or simply runaway from the manor. Over the years, there emerged a new class of people, a middle class (“midway” between serfs and feudal lords). Although by the 12 th century town dwellers constituted less than 15 % of the total European population, the middle class continued to expand and ultimately it came to dominate Western society.
Medieval drama, like Greek drama, had its roots in religious performance: specifically, the Catholic Mass. Like the “Play of Herod”. 11 th-13 th centuries plays expanded in staging techniques, Performances moved from the choir to the church doorway, and then into the town square. While medieval plays were a popular form of entertainment, they were principally didactic (with message), functioning as sources of religious and moral entertainment.
On a symbolic level, the poems describes the spiritual pilgrimage for the Christian soul from sin (Hell), through purification (Purgatory), and ultimately, to salvation (Paradise). He rejected the Latin of churchmen and scholars and wrote in his native Italian, the language of everyday speech. Dante called his poem a comedy because the piece begins with affliction (hell) and ends with joy (Heaven).
– He points to hell with his right hand. The mount of Purgatory with its seven terraces is behind him. Florence’s cathedral (with its newly finished dome) represents Paradise on the poet’s left.
Where they are punished according to the nature of their sins: the violent are immersed for eternity in boiling blood and the gluttons wallow like pigs in their own excrement. By the law of symbolic retribution, the sinners are punished not for but by their sins. Those condemned for sins of passion- the least grave of sins-inhabit the conical rings at the top of hell, while those who have committed sins for the will lie farther down. Those guilty of sins for the intellect are imprisoned still lower, deep with in the pit ruled by Satan . Thus, Dante’s hell proclaims a moral hierarchy and a divinely graded system in which the damned suffer their proper destiny.
At bologna, Paris, Oxford, and Cambridge, to name but four among some 80 universities founded during the Middle ages, the best minds of Europe grappled with the compelling ideas of their day often testing those ideas against the teachings of the Church. Exams for the bachelor of arts (B.A.) degree, usually taken upon completion of a 3- 5 year course of study, were oral. Beyond the B.A. degree, one might pursue additional study leading to mastery of a specialized field. The master of the arts (M.A.) degree qualified the student to teach theology or practice law or medicine. Still another 4 years of study ere usually required for the doctoral candidate, whose efforts culminated in his defense of a thesis before a board of learned masters. (tradition required the successful candidate to honor his examiners wit a banquet)
Like a tourist destination people would come from miles to see the church and its relics.
Reliquaries - a container or shrine where relics such as the remains of a saint are kept
One of 25 remaining Hindu temple-shrines, rises like a beehive-shaped stone mountain, its facades embellished by a multitude of high-relief sculptures drawn from Hindu lore and literature. Compare this to Notre Dame no two artistic enterprises could stand further apart in their imagery, Whereas the medieval church discouraged the representation of nudity as symbolic of sexual desire and sinfulness,
Hinduism invited the display of sculptured nudes, often erotically posed, The exaltation of the body as a vessel of abundance, prosperity, and regeneration, so evident in Hindu temple sculpture, reflects the Hindu respect for the union of human and and divine love.
If a single icon had to be chosen to represent the extraordinarily rich and complex cultural heritage of India, the Shiva Nataraja might well be the most remunerative (paying somebody or rewarding somebody with money) candidate. It is such a brilliant iconographic invention that it comes as close to being a summation of the genius of the Indian people as any single icon can. Sculptures of Shiva dancing survive from at least as early as the fifth century, but it was under the rule of the great Chola dynasty of southern India (ca. 860–1279) that the world-famous iconographic type evolved. The setting of Shiva's dance is the golden hall of Chidambaram, at the center of the universe, in the presence of all the gods. Through symbols and dance gestures, Shiva taught the illustrious gathering that he is Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer. As he danced he held in his upper right hand the damaru , the hand drum from which issued the primordial vibrating sound of creation. With his lower right hand he made the gesture of abhaya , removing fear, protecting, and preserving. In his upper left hand he held agni , the consuming fire of dynamic destruction. With his right foot he trampled a dwarflike figure ( apasmara purusha ), the ignoble personification of illusion who leads humankind astray. In his dance of ecstasy Shiva raised his left leg, and, in a gesture known as the gaja hasta , pointed to his lifted leg to provide refuge for the troubled soul. He thus imparted the lesson that through belief in him, the soul can be transported from the bondage of illusion and ignorance to salvation and eternal serenity. Encircling Shiva is a flaming body halo ( prabhamandala , or surrounding effulgence) that not only establishes the visual limits of this complex and dynamic composition but also symbolizes the boundaries of the cosmos. Source: Shiva as Lord of the Dance (Nataraja) [Tamil Nadu, India] (1987.80.1) | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art
This polychrome wooden figure of Guanyin is possibly the best-preserved and most magnificent sculpture from this period of Chinese Buddhist art. A bodhisattva, unlike a Buddha, refrains from entering Nirvana until all sentient beings have attained enlightenment. Guanyin, the bodhisattva most associated with compassion by Chinese Buddhist followers, is depicted here in a pose of royal ease. Gentle and calming, the Guanyin bodhisattva would appeal to patrons in need of emotional support and guidance. With coloring dated to no later than the mid-16th century, the sculpture’s vivid tonal intensity adds to the bodhisattva’s emotional approachability.
Notational signs traditionally written above the words to indicate tonal ascent or descent. Polyphony was a western invention; it did not make its appearance in Asia until modern times.
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