medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Jim Bugslag wrote:
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
> culture
>
>> Where the outer wall of the gallery is glazed, and there are
>> substantial access staircases, the question of liturgical use of the
>> gallery rears its head :-)
>
> As John says, this is indeed, a problem. In some galleries, such as
> that of Laon Cathedral, there are chapels opening from the gallery,
> so they clearly had a liturgical function, but more work would
> probably have to be done on individual cathedral buildings (a project
> that has been surprisingly neglected, in general) to ascertain
> exactly how galleries functioned liturgically. In some early
> Christian churches, e.g. Hagios Demetrios in Thessaloniki, the
> gallery seems to have accommodated the women in a strictly segregated
> congregation, but so far as I
> know, there is little evidence of such usage later in the Middle Ages.
What startled me was the size of the spiral staircases at Durham - they
(four, IIRC) are about 6ft wide! You could take a procession up them...
The galleries at Durham are wide, light and airy.
> As for triforia, anyone who has ever tried to struggle through one
> knows what an awkward and, often, dirty business that is. It is
> difficult to imagine that they were used liturgically, and just how
> they were used, or why they were there in the first place, remains, I
> believe, a mystery. They certainly look nice from the floor of the
> church, though.
You have to remember that all wall passages, at whatever level, are just
permanent scaffolding - they are there for maintenance.
John Briggs
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