through the large windows in the flat east wall and because the aisle
bays have transverse barrel vaults(tunnel-like vaults perpendicular to
the nave) that channel light from outside to the center of the building.
The architect used pointed arches—a feature of Cluny III (FIG. 17-8)—
both in the nave arcade and in the barrel vaults. Romanesque builders
may have thought this feature gave churches the look and feel of the
architecture of the Holy Land, but pointed arches also brought struc-
tural advantages. Pointed arches transfer the thrust of the vaults more
directly downward to the piers and require less buttressing on the
sides than do round arches. This forward-looking structural device
would permit Gothic architects to increase the height of the nave dra-
matically (see Chapter 18).
Painting and Other Arts
Unlike the practices of placing vaults over naves and aisles and deco-
rating building facades with monumental stone reliefs, the art of
painting did not need to be “revived” in the Romanesque period.
Monasteries produced illuminated manuscripts in large numbers in
the early Middle Ages, and even the Roman tradition of mural paint-
ing had never died. But the quantity of preserved frescoes and illus-
trated books from the Romanesque era is unprecedented.
MORALIA IN JOBOne of the major Romanesque scriptoria was
at the abbey of Cîteaux, mother church of the Cistercian order. Just
before Bernard joined the monastery in 1112, the monks completed
work on an illuminated copy of Saint Gregory’s (Pope Gregory the
Great, r. 590–604) Moralia in Job.It is an example of Cistercian illumi-
nation before Bernard’s passionate opposition to figural art in monas-
teries led in 1134 to a Cistercian ban on elaborate paintings in manu-
scripts as well as sculptural ornamentation in monasteries. After 1134
the Cistercian order prohibited full-page illustrations, and even initial
letters had to be nonfigurative and of a single color. The historiated
initial reproduced here (FIG. 17-15) clearly would have been in vio-
lation of Bernard’s ban had it not been painted before his prohibitions
took effect. A knight, his squire, and two roaring dragons form an in-
tricate letter R,the initial letter of the salutation Reverentissimo.This
page is the opening of Gregory’s letter to “the very reverent”
Leander (ca. 534 – 600), bishop of Seville, Spain. The knight is a slen-
der, regal figure who raises his shield and sword against the dragons
while the squire, crouching beneath him, runs a lance through one of
the monsters. Although the clergy viewed the duel between knight and
dragons as an allegory of the spiritual struggle of monks against the
devil for the salvation of souls, Bernard opposed this kind of illumina-
tion, just as he condemned carvings of monstrous creatures and
“fighting knights” on contemporary cloister capitals (see “Bernard of
Clairvaux on Cloister Sculpture,” page 438).
Ornamented initials date to the Hiberno-Saxon period (FIG.
16-8), but in the Moralia in Jobthe artist translated the theme intoFrance and Northern Spain 44317-14Interior of the abbey church of Notre-Dame, Fontenay, France,
1139–1147.
The Cistercians were great builders but rejected sculptural ornament.
The Fontenay church is typically austere, with its single-story nave and
square east end lacking ambulatory or chapels.
17-15Initial R with knight fighting dragons, folio 4 verso of the
Moralia in Job,from Cîteaux, France, ca. 1115–1125. Ink and tempera
on vellum, 1 13 – 4 91 – 4 . Bibliothèque Municipale, Dijon.
Ornamented initials date to the Hiberno-Saxon era (FIG. 16-8), but
this artist translated the theme into Romanesque terms. The duel
between knight and dragons symbolized a monk’s spiritual struggle.1 in.17-15AInitial L,
Codex
Colbertinus,
ca. 1100.