Impact of the Romanesque | Irish Architecture | Briefing | Professor Roger Stalley

Early Architecture in Irreland & Romanesque Architecture in England

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Impact of the Romanesque | Irish Architecture in the Early Middle Ages: c. 500–1200 AD
Professor Roger Stalley

The arrival of the Romanesque in Ireland is associated with church reform: attempts to bring Irish religious practices into line with rest of Europe: and the introduction of Augustinian order and the Cistercians.

Ireland, Cashel, Cormac's Chapel, Exterior View

Ireland, Cashel, Cormac's Chapel, Interior View

The first Romanesque buildings: Cormac's Chapel at Cashel (1127–34) features square towers, doorways in recessed orders, barrel and ribbed vaults, quarried stone, and architectural sculpture. Cormac's chapel boasts one of the finest looking corbelled roof which is constructed of ashlar, cut from local sandstone. Although impressive in appearance, the structural components were not as well integrated as in some of the earlier examples: the barrel vault was too low to support the roof, which instead had to be reinforced by a pointed vault immediately under the external masonry.

A more radical innovation occurred here with the addition of square towers incorporated at the east end of the nave, presenting a new architectural model for the Irish church. Paired towers, flanking the chancel or the apse, were a feature of many churches within the German Empire, and it has long been assumed that those at Cashel were derived from St James at Regensburg or one of the other Schöttenkirchen. But eastern towers and turrets were also a feature of Norman churches in England, so the background may be closer to home.¹ . But this particular architectural formula was not repeated elsewhere in Ireland.

In addition, Cormac's Chapel was among the first Irish buildings to be embellished with sculpture, and as such is thought to mark the birth of Hiberno-Romanesque, providing an initial injection of foreign techniques, which within a few years were integrated into Irish practice.²

Within the ancient monasteries, the "small" church survived. Romanesque developed principally as a decorative style; in architecture key features are the addition of chancels to single cell buildings, the use of ashlar, and the introduction of arches, frequently decorated.

The prominence given in the annals to the consecration of Cormac's Chapel in 1134 suggests that the novelties of the building were widely appreciated, which makes it curious that the architecture did not have a greater influence. The artistic splendor was enhanced by painted decoration, remnants of which survive in the chancel, where human figures, one wearing a crown, can be discerned on the vault.³ The scheme was carried out with costly materials, which included lapis lazulae, vermilion and gold leaf. The purpose of so much expenditure on one relatively small building has never been satisfactorily established. The sumptuous decoration, along with the crowned figure in the vault, provides a regal atmosphere, which implies that this was a private chapel for the kings of Munster, intended perhaps as a burial place for Cormac himself.

Cistercians introduce European methods of monastic planning - the cloister, axial relationships, integrated buildings, etc.

1.	Roger Stalley, 'Three Irish Buildings with West Country Origins', in P.Draper and N.Coldstream (eds.), Medieval Art and Architecture at Wells and Glastonbury, British Archaeological Association, Conference transactions, 1981, pp 62–5. M.G.Jarrett and H.Mason, 'Greater and More Splendid: Some Aspects of Romanesque Durham Cathedral', The Antiquaries Journal , 75 (1995), pp 212–22

2.	Liam de Paor, 'Cormac's Chapel, the beginnings of Irish Romanesque', in E.Rynne (ed.), Munster Studies, Essays presented to Monsignor Michael Moloney (Limerick, 1967), 133–145.

3.	Mark Perry, 'The Romanesque frescoes in Cormac's Chapel, Cashe'', Ireland of the Welcomes, vol. 44, no. 2 (1995), 16–19. The only parallel for painted decoration of this sort in a Romanesque context is to be found at Lismore, O'Keefe, 'Lismore and Cashel', 126–7.