 Amiens floorplan: massive piers support the west end towers; transepts are abbreviated; seven radiating chapels form the chevet reached from the ambulatory This article discusses cathedral diagrams. These floor plans show the sections of walls and piers, giving an idea of the profiles of their columns and ribbing. Light double lines in perimeter walls indicate glazed windows. Dashed lines show the ribs of the vaulting overhead. By convention, ecclesiastical floorplans are shown map-fashion, with north to the top and the liturgical east end to the right. Image File history File links AmiensDB363. ...
Image File history File links AmiensDB363. ...
This article is about an architectural feature; for the astronomical term see apsis. ...
The ambulatory (Med. ...
A cathedral is a Christian church building, specifically of a denomination with an episcopal hierarchy, such as the Anglican, Catholic and some Lutheran churches, which serves as the central church of a diocese, and thus as a bishops seat. ...
Floor plan (floorplan, floor-plan) in its original meaning is an architecture term, a diagram of a room, a building, or a level (floor) of a building as if seen from the above (i. ...
In architecture, a vault is an arched structure of masonry, forming a ceiling or canopy. ...
Many abbey churches have floorplans that are comparable to cathedrals, though sometimes with more emphasis on the sanctuary and choir spaces that are reserved for the religious community. Smaller churches are similarly planned, with simplifications.
There is a separate article on Cathedral architecture of Western Europe. Cologne Cathedral, Germany, bearing the tallest paired spires in the world. ...
West end
The main doors are at the west end, and there are often towers on that end flanking an opening, sometimes a triple opening, into the nave, often below a stained glass "rose window." The presence or planned presence of towers reveals itself by more massive stonework at floorplan level: see Amiens (illustration right). The narthex forms a kind of lobby or interior porch on some plans, though not at Amiens, where the central door opens into the nave and the side doors open directly into the aisles. Links to full descriptions of the elements of a Gothic floorplan are also found at the entry Cathedral diagram. ...
Strictly speaking, stained glass is glass that has been painted with silver stain and then fired. ...
The rose window in Bristol Cathedral, Bristol, England, at the western end of the nave. ...
To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...
The narthex of a church is the entrance or lobby area. ...
Nave - Main articles: Nave, Aisle.
The nave (from the Latin for "ship," navis) is the long central section directly inside the main (liturgical west end) doors, where the public attends services. The nave is ordinarily flanked by aisles. If the aisles are comparable in height and width, the plan may be described as having three naves. More often the aisles are lower, and a clerestory above their roofs lets light into the nave. Recesses in the walling of the aisles may provide spaces for shallow side chapels, as at Metz (illustration below, right). Links to full descriptions of the elements of a Gothic floorplan are also found at the entry Cathedral diagram. ...
In a modern church an aisle is a row down the middle of the church with a set of pews on each side. ...
Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire, England. ...
The plans show structural stonework; they omit the usual rood screen ("rood" meaning "cross") dividing the nave from the choir (earlier, "quire"), which may be almost as long as the nave, as at Salisbury (below, left). The back-choir or retro-choir is a space behind the high altar in the quire of a church, in which there is a small altar standing back to back with the other. The Rood screen was a common feature in late medieval church architecture, dividing the chancel from the nave. ...
Look up Altar in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
The choir stalls in the quire of Bristol Cathedral, Bristol, England A quire is the area of a church where the choir sits, also known as the choir. ...
To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ...
In the nave, monks would attend their own services ("offices") in an abbey church; in a cathedral the canons would perform similar service. Against the screen, on its west side toward the nave where the public could see it, is usually an altar.
Image File history File links Download high resolution version (1500x824, 171 KB)Salisbury Cathedral plan, from G. Dehio and G. von Bezold, Die Kirchliche Baukunst des Abendlandes, Stuttgart, 1887-1902, plate 424 The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United...
Image File history File links Download high resolution version (1500x824, 171 KB)Salisbury Cathedral plan, from G. Dehio and G. von Bezold, Die Kirchliche Baukunst des Abendlandes, Stuttgart, 1887-1902, plate 424 The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United...
Salisbury Cathedral in the early morning light. ...
Transept In cruciform (cross-shaped) churches, the arms of the cross (together, the "transept") which form an aisle across the building are quite pronounced; however, the transept arms might be so short as not to stick out past the sides of the building (as at Notre-Dame de Paris), or there may be two of them, as at Canterbury Cathedral and Salisbury (left). The transept itself may have an aisle as at St-Denis or Salisbury, or two aisles, or it may have none. Full descriptions of the elements of a Gothic floorplan are found at the entry Cathedral diagram. ...
In a modern church an aisle is a row down the middle of the church with a set of pews on each side. ...
This article is about the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris. ...
Canterbury Cathedral from the southwest. ...
Some Gothic churches, such as Bourges, have no transepts at all and thus are not cruciform. At the ends of the transept are doors, too, and outside them are porches that were used for various rituals. Bourges is a town and commune in central France. ...
A porch is an architectural feature relating to a floor-like platform structure attached to the front or back entrance of a residence. ...
 Metz Cathedral: the asymmetry of the facade is revealed in the plan; exterior buttresses at the transept corners enable great expanses of glass Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1655x859, 184 KB)Metz. ...
Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1655x859, 184 KB)Metz. ...
For other uses of Metz, see Metz (disambiguation) City motto: Si paix dedans, paix dehors (French: If peace inside, peace outside) City proper (commune) Région Lorraine Département Moselle (57) Mayor Jean-Marie Rausch Area 41. ...
A buttress (and mostly concealed, a flying buttress) supporting walls at the Palace of Westminster Four different types of buttress: diagonal, on the statues plinth; an ordinary buttress supporting a flying buttress, to the right of the statue; a small ordinary buttress to the right side of the picture...
Liturgical east end The end with the altar in it is normally at the east (right in the diagrams), for symbolic religious reasons, though frequently the building cannot be disposed in such a way as to make that orientation very precise. Beyond the crossing where the transept intersects the nave are the choir and the presbytery which may be a single space and the sanctuary, site of the high altar. Look up Altar in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
An ancient Roman altar An altar is any structure upon which sacrifices or other offerings are offered for religious purposes. ...
The next section to the east after the choir is the presbytery (meaning "priestly"), where the priests who assist at Mass sit; that section is not usually separate and may be only a couple of fancy chairs at the side. A presbytery can be - * the residence of one or more presbyters, priests, or religious elders; - * an area of a church or cathedral reserved for priests; - * the collective college of priests in a diocese, archdiocese, or prelature; - * the local unit in the polity of a Presbyterian church, consisting of presbyters (i. ...
A Medieval Low Mass by a bishop. ...
The heart of the building is the sanctuary where the "high altar" is. There are altars in many of the chapels, but this is the one where Mass is said for the public. This area was also where criminals seeking the right of sanctuary were safe from the law. Very often the sanctuary was raised a few steps above the floor level of the nave. Beneath the sanctuary is often a crypt, which may be earlier or may mark a pre-Christian holy space. When cathedrals are enlarged, the nave may be extended and a narthex added, the choir may be rebuilt with an ambulatory and chapels, but most usually the consecrated place that is the sanctuary remains at the same place. Sanctuary has multiple meanings. ...
Crypt is also a commonly used name of water trumpets, aquatic plants. ...
The semi-circular end of the church around the high altar, which corresponds to the apse in Romanesque and Roman architecture, is often expanded into a passage called an ambulatory (from the Latin to walk), with radiating chapels disposed around the outer wall of the ambulatory. Thus users can make a complete circuit within the building, using the north and south aisles of the nave and the ambulatory, without trespassing upon the sanctuary. In the bays around the ambulatory, between the supporting columns, are shrines and chapels. At the far east end, on the axis formed by nave and sanctuary, a larger chapel is often dedicated to the patron saint of the church, or to Mary, the mother of Jesus, this in medieval English usageis a Lady Chapel. This article is about an architectural feature; for the astronomical term see apsis. ...
Romanesque St. ...
The ambulatory (Med. ...
Latin is an ancient Indo-European language originally spoken in Latium, the region immediately surrounding Rome. ...
A chapel is a private church, usually small and often attached to a larger institution such as a college, a hospital, a palace, or a prison. ...
Eastern Orthodox shrine Buddhist shrine just outside Wat Phnom. ...
In several forms of the church of Christianity, but especially in Roman Catholicism, a patron saint has special affinity for a trade or group. ...
Saint Mary and Saint Mary the Virgin both redirect here. ...
The chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin and attached to churches of large size. ...
"Chantries" are shrines or chapels where someone has paid an "endowment" to have the monks say (or "chant") prayers on a fixed schedule for someone who died. Chantry is a term for the English establishment of a shrine or chapel on private land where monks or priests would say (or chant) prayers on a fixed schedule, usually for someone who had died. ...
Mary Magdalene in prayer. ...
The apse did not last long as an architectural fashion; in Europe it was replaced by the rounded "chevet," (Amiens, Metz) and in England by squared-off east ends, and as the cathedrals were rebuilt or repaired, their apses were often remodeled into the newer shapes. This article is about an architectural feature; for the astronomical term see apsis. ...
This article is about an architectural feature; for the astronomical term see apsis. ...
Subsidiary buildings Outside the cathedral there is occasionally a "chapter house" where the monks or priests whose church it was would hold their meetings about church business; chapter houses are often octagonal or another polygonal shape and are usually connected to the church building. There are twelve extant cathedral chapter houses in the world today. There is also usually a "cloister," a rectangular colonnade around an open space that often has a central well, set in a paved or graveled space, where the monks may walk;their work or study cubicles often open onto the cloister. A chapter house is a building or room attached to a cathedral or collegiate church in which meetings are held. ...
Cloister of Saint Trophimus, in Arles, France A cloister (from latin claustrum) is a part of cathedral, monastic and abbey architecture. ...
The cathedral often stands in its own walled precinct, called in England the close.
See also: Cathedral architecture of Western Europe Cologne Cathedral, Germany, bearing the tallest paired spires in the world. ...
External links |
Feeds |
Contact