Chapter 9 - Reading Architecture

Summary

FOR AN ARCHITECTURAL historian, the environment in which a piece of architecture was created and functioned is a fundamental task. In this book we have presented hypotheses for why architectural forms and patterns were created and what their functions were. We have made use of historical data and of archaeological research, such as traces in the stratigraphic system of the studied area, providing information about the needs of dwellers of a given territory at a given time.In the case of what we have called Younger Europe, given the shortage of written evidence, archaeology will be crucial for future research into the social, cultural, and religious developments of the local population. Artefacts, both produced locally and those imported, are of considerable importance. The latter include collections of small objects closely related to Christianity and brought in from other cultures.In the field of architecture, artefacts found in close proximity to physical remains are of particular interest.All help provide a general context—social, religious, economic, and cultural—for any given building, when we set ourselves the research problems I defined at the outset—what was the origin of architectural models and forms and the resulting semantic codes, and how exactly did they make their way to these new territories? Let us conclude our analysis by looking at the roots of art and architecture in this region and at this period, taking Piast, Přemyslid, and Árpád art and architecture in turn.

Art forms created between the ninth and eleventh centuries under Piast rule had several backgrounds. Generally speaking, they were based on the forms and ideas of the pagan world. Native Slavic traditions co-existed with influences from the Celtic world and other pagan cultures.Elements of Celtic culture came from Celts having occupied lands later ruled by the Piasts. Influences from other pagan cultures were usually versions of ideas filtered through Christianity, which adapted itself to local traditions. When seen as a philosophical and religious movement, Christianity was the other fundamental element in art and architecture.It evoked ideas originating in the assorted communities and centres of the Ottonian Empire, rooted in the Carolingian and ancient Roman empires.

Early art and architecture in Přemyslid lands, including that evolving under Přemyslid rule, drew on native Slavic tradition and heritage, being connected to the social structure known as “Great Moravia.”