Romanesque Architecture

What is Romanesque architecture?

Romanesque architecture is a medieval building style that uses thick walls, round arches, small windows and barrel or groin vaults. In Slovak it is called románska architektúra. In Slovakia the style survives mostly in churches, and above all in rotundas, which are churches on a circular plan.

Slovak sites show how the style relates to Gothic architecture. Romanesque churches stood first. Later builders rebuilt or replaced many of them in the Gothic style, in Košice, in Bratislava and at Spišská Kapitula. A style label does not date a building, because each site has its own dates. The examples below range from the 11th century at Skalica to the late 13th century at Šivetice.

What are the main features of a Romanesque building?

General descriptions of the style list round arches, thick walls, small windows and barrel or groin vaults. Two Slovak rotundas show these features on site.

• Thick walls. The rotunda in Skalica has walls 1.3 to 1.4 m thick. Its source calls this unusually thick for this type of building.
• Round arches. Doorways, windows and arcades are semicircular, not pointed.
• A semicircular apse. The sanctuary is a half-circle. Both the Skalica and the Šivetice rotundas have one.
• Conch vaults. A half-dome, called a conch, roofs the apse. The Skalica source calls its conch original.
• Wall paintings. Šivetice keeps Romanesque polychromes in two bands around the apse. The upper band shows a cycle about St Margaret and the lower band shows seven scenes from the life of Christ.

Not every feature survives in every building. The Skalica rotunda kept its apse, conch and thick walls, but later builders altered its roof, nave vault and windows. A survey should therefore identify each element separately and not assume that the whole building matches the style.

Which Romanesque buildings can you see in Slovakia?

The table lists four sites. Each row gives only what the cited pages report.

The Šivetice date needs a note. The Monuments Board record, supplied through Europeana, gives the second quarter of the 13th century. Medievalheritage.eu gives the same date, but another passage in the same text says the rotunda was probably built in the early 1340s. The two passages cannot both be right. This article uses the Monuments Board date and treats the 1340s date as unconfirmed. The paintings are dated separately, to around 1270 in one passage and to the end of the 13th century in another.

How is Romanesque architecture different from Gothic architecture?

Both styles built stone churches, and many buildings carry features of both. The Skalica rotunda shows this on one site. Around 1435 its nave walls were raised and a second floor was added. The Gothic period also added a portal under the roof and a pointed window with trefoil tracery in the apse.

The table gives the general contrast. Each row describes a pattern, not a rule that every building follows.

Gothic work in Slovakia starts later than the Romanesque examples above. In Bratislava the Gothic church began at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries. In Košice the Gothic church began about 1390.

Why do Romanesque buildings look different today?

Later owners altered most Romanesque buildings. After 1650 the Skalica rotunda was rebuilt in the Baroque style. It received a new roof, a new nave vault and new windows, and it lost its defensive function. A bomb damaged it in 1945. Repairs between 1949 and 1954 removed the external plaster and exposed Romanesque and Gothic elements.

Šivetice also has layers. Gothic paintings were added in the 14th century, and in 1750 the rotunda received a Baroque belfry and raised walls. Plaster and later additions can hide original fabric. Survey an old church before you decide what its walls or vaults are made of. The Skalica source does not name the wall material, so check it on site. The Monuments Board record calls the Šivetice rotunda a brick building.

How are Romanesque buildings protected in Slovakia?

Act No. 49/2002 Z. z. on the protection of the monuments fund (zákon o ochrane pamiatkového fondu) governs protected buildings. The act defines the pamiatkový fond, the monuments fund. It is the set of movable and immovable things declared national cultural monuments, monument reserves and monument zones (§ 2 ods. 1). The Monuments Office of the Slovak Republic (Pamiatkový úrad SR) keeps the central list, which has a register of immovable cultural monuments (§ 22). Its website links to the registers.

Check the register before you design anything. If the building is an immovable cultural monument, the owner must first ask the regional monuments office for a decision (§ 32 ods. 2). Within 10 m of the monument, no building or other activity may endanger it (§ 27 ods. 2). Only an authorised person may prepare the renovation design (§ 32 ods. 8). For rules on a house inside a protected area, see heritage protection zone and heritage authority consent.