Social and Architectural Transformations in Medieval Europe
Hunger, War, and Plague
Commencement In the fourteenth century in Europe, there was an agricultural crisis, consequently, a series of poor harvests caused by unfavorable weather and low-quality land due to extensive exploitation. The coincidence of these factors led to a significant decrease in wheat production, and famine spread throughout the continent. This initial problem was compounded by another: the frequent wars between feudal lords. The lands where these battles took place or through which their armies transited were devastated. In addition, the forests sheltered outlaws, increasing insecurity along the paths. The hardest time was in 1347, when the Black Death swept Europe, affecting a malnourished population and causing a significant increase in mortality.
Peasant Revolts
The decline in population had immediate effects on the countryside, where manpower began to be scarce, and many farmlands were abandoned. The lords saw their income decrease, and to compensate for this imbalance, they increased taxes on peasants, tightened the living conditions of servitude, and prevented them from leaving the land. The lack of food, the high prices, and the worsening of living conditions led to increased social tensions in the country. Peasant revolts spread throughout Europe, which had a clearly anti-feudal character, such as the Jacquerie in France.
Urban Revolts
The crisis also reached the cities, where mortality was higher than in rural areas. The scarcity and increasing cost of food, the decline in craft activity, and the reduction of commerce ruined many traders and craftsmen, causing poverty among the working classes in general. Faced with increasing poverty, the most disadvantaged groups demanded a number of improvements (increased wages, the right to work) and also greater access to municipal positions, monopolized by the urban patriciate. The riots spread to many European cities (Ghent, Florence, Paris, Barcelona) and were often accompanied by attacks on Jewish neighborhoods (pogroms, 1391). These uprisings were forcefully repressed by the feudal nobility, the urban upper classes, and the royal authority.
Peasants Revolt
People were gathering in Beauvaisis and said that destroying all nobles in the kingdom would be a great good. They exited, armed only with clubs and knives, to the residence of a knight, killed him and his pregnant wife and all his children, and the castle was set on fire. Were these bad people stealing and burning? They acted like rabid dogs. [They] burned over sixty residences and castles. The knights confronted these rascals, and alliances were formed, and they attacked them with swords.
New Urban Constructions
From the twelfth century, new construction techniques were used in a new artistic style: the Gothic. From France, where it was born, it spread to the West, where buildings were built higher and more luminous. The development of the economy and the increased population in the cities led to the necessity of building new constructions. In this way, numerous groups of stonemasons, bricklayers, and carpenters emerged in the cities, led by master builders and architects, who built palaces for nobles and merchants, municipal buildings for city government, and markets for traders. But, above any other building, grand temples and cathedrals were erected in medieval towns, symbols of the economic power and the faith of their people.
Cathedrals and Gothic Churches
The main features of Gothic architecture are:
- Use of a new kind of arch, higher and lighter, which, by the way, is called pointed or ogival.
- A new type of vault, also called pointed. It consisted of sections separated by pointed arches.
- Each section is composed of two crossed arches resting on four points of support: columns or pillars.
- With the new arch, taller buildings could be constructed, and the weight of the roof was distributed more efficiently, as it rested on the walls more uprightly.
- This allowed the walls to have large windows adorned with colored glass or stained glass.
- To hold the force of the vaults, the exterior walls utilized a complex system of flying buttresses and buttresses, which distributed the weight and reinforced the walls.
- Pinnacles were used as decoration, crowning the buttresses and topped with spires.
- The Gothic portal inherited the basic elements of the Romanesque: archivolts decorated with large statues, a tympanum in the central area, and a splayed door divided into two leaves.
- The plant remained essentially a Latin cross, with long arms and a short transept.
Sculpture
Gothic sculpture was mainly used for decorating churches. Other constructive elements were gargoyles, used to evacuate rainwater that fell on the roof. From the fourteenth century, sculpture became independent of architecture and adorned altarpieces in churches or funeral monuments. Gothic sculpture was far more realistic than Romanesque, both in terms of clothing and the representation of the human face. In some cases, such as the figures in tombs, the sculptures were portraits of the person represented. They began to sculpt freestanding images depicting kings or important people, and the characters were endowed with a sense of movement and volume that did not exist in Romanesque art. The sculptures formed scenes. Finally, while most Romanesque sculptures are by unknown authors, many Gothic sculptures or altarpieces have known authors. In Spain, there are important works by Pere Joan, Pere Oller, Guillem Sagrera, and Gil de Siloé. However, the profusion of decorative elements would give the appearance of a more complex and taller structure, and the arches were much more slender.
Painting
Gothic painting shows concern for new issues, such as the representation of depth, the study of the anatomy of characters, the thorough and detailed description of daily life, the representation of feelings, and a new assessment of light and color. In the Gothic period, reality was reflected; for this reason, although the themes were essentially religious, the people represented were faithful portraits of the men and women of the time.
Miniatures and Altarpieces
The structure of the new Gothic churches, where part of the walls was replaced by large windows, reduced the space for painting compared to the Romanesque. This led to the generalization of painting on wood (panels and altarpieces), which mainly occupied the central apse of the temple, behind the altar. The Gothic panels were usually commissioned by the Church, other institutions (municipal governments, guilds), or by bourgeois or nobles who wanted to demonstrate their religiosity. Often, the figure of the donor was depicted in a corner of the painting. In this period, miniatures adorning sacred books, chronicles, and stories were also important.