Sex And Violence In the Abbey Church of St. Mary Magdalen, Vezelay*

Vicki says absolutely no one will look at a post of my scores of pix of the capitals inside the church at Vezelay. That's where the great 11th and 12th century sculpture is. So I have re-titled it a bit. Here, anyway, is a modest sampling. In some you can pick out an obvious Biblical story or later Medieval Christian legend. In others, you'll have to add your own interpretation of some great religious or moral truth...or just marvel at what the high Medieval mind and art were capable of...

*The title refers to Peter Cook's "Memoirs of a Miner"

Vezelay Abbey Church Of St. Mary Magdalen/Madeleine

So in one day we get to see the beginning of Gothic and the end of Romanesque. Well, not exactly, since these things have no sharp lines. But Sens is a very early Gothic, and Vezelay a late Romanesque. Both very pronounced in style, architecture, situation, purpose. Sens in a city, ruling over other cities, bishoprically at least. Vezelay out in the countryside, remote, an abbey, but an important one.

Vezelay is a famous place, on the World Heritage Site list now for more than 30 years. Kings Richard and Philip quartered here before embarking on the 2nd Crusade. Becket preached here, threatening to excommunicate anyone who ate mushy peas. Vezelay's monks claimed to hold the relics of Mary Magdalen, the most famous of saved repentant sinners, and Vezelay was already on one of the four classic routes to the great pilgrimage site of Santiago in Galicia. Times were good. The great church was built in the 11th and 12th centuries, a sizable narthex added later in the 12th to accommodate all the pilgrims. But then, in 1279, someone else claimed to have found the tomb of St. Mary Magdalen, right here in France (!), and, Medieval standards of evidence being what they were (numbers of witnesses to putative miracles, wads of cash paid to bishops, popes, kings, et al., marriages, maybe a few murders, etc), Vezelay declined and some other place became important. Decline is good sometimes, however, if it leads to preservation. At Vezelay we have a late Romanesque church, a big one, with great sculpture all around.

West facade

Some interesting sculpture outside, most of it inside...

In the narthex, a great Judgment

Our hearts leapt as we saw this...but, alas, it turned out to be a 19th century
reconstruction (they had their own ideas about what "Medieval" should look like)

Nave...barrel vaulting, pretty Romanesque

Elevation in nave...aisle, small clerestory windows

Abaft

In the chancel/choir, however, we have a small gallery/
triforium, then celrestory; and vaulting that is clearly of
the new style

Altar view abaft

In the crypt (where Sister Sue admonished us about no fotos and the need to pray
for world peace)(I told her no worries, Obama would take care of that)

Aisle view

Outside now; the buttresses, both integral and flying, were added later, we read

Tower

Bow view

The church is high on the hill, quite a climb up from the parking, with a commanding
view of beautiful countryside

An impressive place, seriously; but wait, there's more

Sens Cathedral

Sens Cathedral is one of the earliest of Gothic buildings, sometimes cited as the first completely Gothic cathedral. It is indeed old, as these things go, by a few decades, building having started c. 1140. Sens was an important place in the 12th century: its bishop ruled over those in Paris, and most of the other cities in the Ile de France. Interestingly, it's modest transept was added only in the 13th and 14th centuries.

West facade from the pretty city square

Not one of the great sculptural programs

Again, we had to wait, this time on baptism ceremonies... did they clear this with
Office of Tourism? But Vicki got lots of pix of cute babies in cute baptism outfits

Knave; at this point they were experimenting with alternating piers and double-
columns

Thus; a bit of the elevation too; aisle, tiny triforium/gallery, small clerestory

Harvest is underway big-time in France (except for grapes) and so here
apparently is an offering to Ceres or Demeter or the patron saint of harvests
or whatever

One of the later transept rose windows

With devil

Another Becket window; very popular with bishops as a
cautionary tale...

Beautiful old windows...Prodigal Son and Good Samaritan

Up close from an Old Testament window

Non-Gothic altar

Another beautiful rose window, the Celestial Concert

Detail

Transept view from altar

Important discovery department: according to the plan, the pier in the center
there should have been a double column...the opposite one is a double column...
did they forget, change their minds, run out of funds?! Need some more support
for the tower?

Troyes' Urban Church

The Urban church in Troyes is best known as an example of flamboyant Gothic; plus it took 800 years to build; lots of the flamboyants took centuries to build as people lost interest, plagues, wars, schisms, reformations, wars, etc., intervened. Pope Urban IV began it on the site of his dad's tattoo parlor, but the local nuns took issue, and the whole thing was tied up in legalities for centuries. Plus people, including us, lost interest. To his credit, Urban IV was supposedly the pope from whom Tannhauser begged mercy and who replied that his staff would sooner sprout leaves than such a sinner would be forgiven. Guess what happened?

Normally we just barge right in unless they are having Sunday
brunch, but this time it was a funeral, so we decided to have
our own lunch and wait it out

Flamboyant, yes

Knave view; again, not a big place

Elevation: gone are the galleries, the triforia

Some nice windows

Thus

And more flamboyant; flamboyant is where
Gothic parodies itself