Gothic architecture
Gothic architecture is any of the styles of architecture, particularly associated with cathedrals and other churches, in use throughout Europe during the high and late medieval period, from the 12th century onwards. It was succeeded by Renaissance architecture, a revival of Roman formulas, at varying times in Europe, beginning in Florence in the 15th century.
Notre-Dame Cathedral seen from the River Seine
The term
Gothic architecture has nothing to do with the historical Goths. It was a pejorative term that came to be used as early as the 1530s to describe culture that was considered rude and barbaric. FranÃÂçois Rabelais imagines an inscription over the door of his Utopian Abbey of Theleme, "Here enter no hypocrites, bigots..." slipping in a slighting reference to 'Gotz' (rendered as 'Huns' in Thomas Urquhart's English translation) and 'Ostrogotz.' In English 17th century usage, 'Goth' was an equivalent of 'vandal,' a savage despoiler, with a sense of 'Germanic' and so came to be applied to the architectural styles of northern Europe before the revival of antiquity, thus 'Gothic' architecture.
Origins
The historical style itself originated at the [[Saint Denis Basilica|abbey church of
Saint-Denis]] in Saint-Denis, near Paris, where it exemplified the vision of Abbot Suger. The first truly Gothic construction was the choir of the church, consecrated in 1144. The style was adopted first in northern France and by the English, and spread throughout France, the Low Countries and parts of Germany and also to Spain and northern Italy.
Characteristics
The style emphasizes verticality and features almost skeletal stone structures with great expanses of glass, sharply pointed spires, cluster columns, flying buttresses, ribbed vaults, pointed arches using the ogee shape, and inventive sculptural detail. These features are all the consequence of a focus on large stained glass windows that allowed more light to enter than was possible with older styles. In order to do achieve this flying buttresses were used to enable higher ceilings and slender columns.
Gothic cathedrals could be highly decorated with statues on the outside and painting on the inside. Both usually told Biblical stories, emphasizing Old Testament prophecy and the New Testament (see Christian theology).
Conservative 13th century Gothic in Provence: Basilica of Mary Magdalene, St-Maximin
Important Gothic churches could also be severely simple. At the Basilica of Mary Magdalene in Saint-Maximin, Provence (illustration, right), the local traditions of a sober massive Romanesque architecture were strong. The basilica, begun in the 13th century under the patronage of Charles of Anjou, was laid out on an ambitious scale (it was never completed all the way to the western entrance front) to accommodate pilgrims that came to venerate relics. Building in the Gothic style continued at the basilica until 1532.
In Gothic architecture new technology stands behind the new building style. The Gothic cathedral was supposed to be a microcosm representing the world, and each architectural concept, mainly the loftiness and huge dimensions of the structure, were intended to pass a theological message: the great glory of God versus the smallness and insignificence of the mortal being.
In England, some discrete Gothic details appear on new construction at Oxford and Cambridge in the late 17th century, and at the archbishop of Canterbury's residence Lambeth Palace, a gothic hammerbeam roof was built in 1663 to replace a building that had been sacked during the English Civil War. It is not easy to decide whether these instances were Gothic survival or early appearances of Gothic revival, Gothic features clearly seemed appropriate to the English, in contexts of learning and religion, and these have been centers of neo-Gothic architecture too.
.
In England in the mid-18th century, the Gothic style was more widely revived, first as a decorative, whimsical alternative to Rococo that is still conventionally termed 'Gothick', of which Horace Walpole's Twickenham villa "Strawberry Hill" is the familiar example. Then, especially after the 1830s, Gothic was treated more seriously in a series of Gothic revivals (sometimes termed Victorian Gothic or Neo-Gothic). The Houses of Parliament in London are an example of this Gothic revival style, designed by a major exponent of the early Gothic Revival, Augustus Pugin. Another example is the main building of the University of Glasgow designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott. Neo-Gothic continued to be considered appropriate for college buildings (such as at Chicago, Yale, or Princeton) well into the 20th century, and was used, perhaps less appropriately, for early skyscrapers, such as the Woolworth Building, New York.
Sequence of Gothic styles: France
Sequence of Gothic styles: England
Gothic revival
Some famous Gothic structures
For a list of all Early Gothic buildings in the Paris Basin, http://www.johnjames.com.au/medievaldatabase-parischurches-A-B.shtmlSome famous Neo-Gothic structures
See also