The White Mantle of Churches: Architecture, Liturgy, and Art around the Millennium (review)

The International Medieval Research series publishes collected works which originated as papers given at the International Medieval Congress in Leeds. The new Art History subseries, of which this volume on tenth- and eleventh-century religious architecture is an example, are large format books with an emphasis on integrating text and illustrative material. In this instance, nine of the 14 essays were delivered at Leeds in 2000, while the remaining five were written later.

The papers incorporate architectural evidence into the millennial debate. The point of departure is the famous image from Rodulf Glaber's Historiarum libri quinque: 'Just before the third year after the millennium, throughout the whole world, but most especially in Italy and Gaul, men began to reconstruct churches, although for the most part the existing ones were properly built and not in the least unworthy… It was as if the whole world were shaking itself free, shrugging off the burden of the past, and cladding itself everywhere in a white mantle of churches.' But was this really the case? Overall, the contributors point out that church building had been going on solidly before the millennium (particularly in the German lands, thanks to Ottonian sponsorship) and that pre- and post-millennial religious architecture were part of a continuous line of development. More specifically, religious expansion was already occurring in the eleventh century, and thus any new buildings erected around 1000 were more likely to be the products of a continuing monastic revival than the products of any so-called 'millennial impulse'. Also, German religious architecture underwent significant development in the eleventh century (e.g. in terms of crypts, westworks, Roman features), thus reminding us that Glaber's focus on Italy and France did not tell the whole story.

In England, scholars confront the problem of very few sources. There are no substantial remains for any of the major church buildings from around 1000. Liturgical sources provide some hints of what rituals went on in the churches and, hence, what physical features the churches must have possessed (the Regularis Concordia is the key source here, although valiant attempts are made at gaining information from other sources) but, overall, the information remains patchy. Study of some minor Norman cruciform churches shows that Anglo-Saxon construction styles definitely continued after 1066.

The volume turns next to Glaber's preferred areas of France and Italy. A study of the Cluniac galilea (or narthex) in Burgundy highlights the importance of this west-end church feature in the practice of memorialising the dead. Previous studies conflated the earlier Carolingian westwork with the Cluniac narthex but the two are different in both form and function. Still in Burgundy, St Bénigne in Dijon (where Glaber lived from 1016-30) is today almost totally destroyed, but excavations and eighteenth-century drawings permit some understanding of its medieval glories. The rotunda was particularly stunning, and in form and metaphorical meaning it seems to have drawn the eleventh-century monks back to the Roman and Carolingian periods. In Paris, the nave of the abbey church of St Germain-des-Prés displayed innovations and foreshadowed the architectural styles of churches both in France and elsewhere. Both St Bénigne and St Germain-des-Prés were built by the Italian abbot William of Volpiano, and it may be Glaber's close focus on William that leads to the Italian/French focus of his architectural comments. Turning to Italy, it seems that Glaber actually had very little knowledge of the place, and that it was his respect for William of Volpiano which led him to equate the religious renovations of France and Italy. However, quite apart from Glaber's ignorance of the Italian scene, baptisteries and bell towers were two genuine developments arising out of Italy at this time.

Next comes an essay on Iberian church building. The millennium...