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Divine Light
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Article
by Hillary Smith
published on 08 December 2020
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Gothic cathedrals are some of the most recognizable and magnificent architectural feats.
With soaring towers and softly filtered light streaming through stained glass windows,
everything about the Gothic cathedral is transportive and ethereal, lifting the gaze of the
viewer towards the heavens. Architectural innovations, such as flying buttresses, were
essential to creating the Gothic style, but it was the new, intentional use of light that
truly set Gothic architecture apart from its heavier and darker Romanesque
predecessors.
Basilica of Saint-Denis
by Ninaras (CC BY)
Gothic churches could achieve new heights with a lightness & a gracefulness often
absent from sturdy Romanesque structures.
Not everyone was a fan of the Gothic style. Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574 CE), the Italian
artist and writer whose works are considered to form the basis of modern art historical
study, retrospectively named the style pioneered by Suger as “Gothic,” which was
meant to be derogatory. Writing in the late 16th century CE after the Gothic style had
fallen out of favor, Vasari saw the style as degraded when compared to the classical
forms of the Renaissance architecture of his own era. By calling it Gothic, he attempted
to liken the style to the “barbaric” Goths that had invaded Rome over a thousand years
earlier. Even so, Vasari's disapproval did not stop the Gothic revival from taking root in
the late 18th century CE, and today millions of people each year continue to be
captivated by the unearthly majesty of Gothic cathedrals.
Architectural Components
Pointed Arches
Flying Buttresses
Another unique feature of the Gothic cathedral is the west façade, often seen as the front
of the church, which typically consists of two towers, a central rose window, and three
entranceways. The west façade of the Notre-Dame in Paris, for example, is where the
crowds congregate to gaze up at the elaborate carvings that adorn the building.
Elaborate sculptures carved into the tympanum above each doorway tell a story that a
largely illiterate medieval population could understand. The central portal at Notre-
Dame is known as the Portal of the Last Judgement, the left portal as the Portal of the
Virgin, and the right as the Portal of Saint Anne.
Notre-Dame Cathedral (Paris), West Façade
by Hillary Smith (CC BY-NC-SA)
Rib Vaults
Ribbed vaulting is an essential technique that allowed for the overall increase in size
and intricacy of design in Gothic structures. Romanesque structures had generally used
barrel vaults and groin vaults. Gothic structures, on the other hand, used a diagonal
framework known as rib vaults, enabling the building of taller and thinner structures. In
a Gothic cathedral, it is easy to spot the rib vaults crisscrossing the ceiling of the central
nave.
Rib Vaults, Rouen Cathedral
by Jorge Láscar (CC BY)
Rose Windows
Visitors to Gothic cathedrals are usually struck by the ethereal purple light streaming in
from enormous, circular windows known as rose windows. Taller buildings allowed for
taller windows in general, but the use of stone tracery to reinforce stained glass
windows also made larger windows possible. Additionally, the use of silver stain in the
production of stained glass in the 13th century CE allowed for the creation of a clearer
glass, further brightening the interior of Gothic structures. Though examples of circular
windows can be found in some Romanesque churches prior to the Gothic period, the
rose window became a defining feature of Gothic cathedrals, and with the development
of stone tracery techniques that enabled more panels of glass to be secured into place,
they grew to new proportions. Chartres Cathedral, completed in the early 13th century
CE and located southwest of Paris, has perhaps the most impressive surviving collection
of stained glass dating back to the medieval era.
West Rose Window at Chartres Cathedral
by Jan van der Crabben (CC BY-NC-SA)
Abbot Suger (1081-1151 CE) was a powerful figure in France at an important time in
French history when the monarchy's power was increasing. Advisor to both Louis VI
(1081-1137 CE) and Louis VII (1120-1180 CE), Suger held the position of regent when
Louis VII left for the Second Crusade (1147-1150 CE), which essentially left Suger in
charge of France. Appointed abbot of Saint-Denis in 1122 CE, Suger held the position
for nearly 30 years until his death. Between the years of 1137 and 1148 CE, he
embarked upon an ambitious project to transform the church into a physical
manifestation of the divine, creating what would become the archetype of the Gothic
cathedral. Suger extensively documented his renovations and reasonings in his writings
known as The Book of Suger, Abbot of Saint-Denis: On What Was Done Under His
Administration.
Suger believed that luminous & beautiful material objects could help spiritually
transport the beholder towards the divine realm.
Suger's renovations began with the west façade of the church. The addition of three
portals on a west-facing façade, as well as the soon-to-be ubiquitous rose window, are
essentially innovations of Suger. Largely influenced by Pseudo-Dionysius the
Areopagite's metaphysical understanding of light, Suger believed that luminous and
beautiful material objects could help spiritually transport the beholder towards the
divine realm. For Suger, the church occupied a sort of liminal space between the earthly
and heavenly realms. The intentional use of light, therefore, was a driving force behind
his renovations, the main reason for bringing together the defining architectural
characteristics of the Gothic style in a single building for the first time. Suger's
infatuation with light is exemplified by the words he had inscribed on one of the
cathedral's gilded bronze doors:
The noble work is bright, but, being nobly bright, the work
the lights
Suger believed his brighter church would "brighten the minds" of his congregation,
leading "to the true light, where Christ is the true door." He also specifically states that
material objects can serve as channels for the divine truth: "the dull mind rises to the
truth through material things." A medieval theological understanding of materiality to
which Suger subscribed held that all material objects had the capacity to be vessels of
the divine. Suger justified his elaborate renovations and decorations of gold and
precious gems because he saw them as literal conduits of the divine. The prevailing
belief in the Middle Ages was that material objects, the fancier and more beautiful the
better, could be instruments for connecting with God, and the key ingredient for
activating these objects was light. The use of light in Gothic cathedrals, therefore,
became an architectural technique in its own right; it was just as important to the
construction of a Gothic cathedral as flying buttresses and ribbed vaulting. Light was
seen as literally being of the divine realm, and Suger took great care to eliminate any
obstruction to the calculated flow of the divine light throughout Saint-Denis.
Basilica of Saint-Denis, Main Altar
by ctj71081 (CC BY-NC)
In the Middle Ages, there were important epistemological distinctions between the
concepts of lux, lumen, and splendor, words used to describe light with varying levels
of metaphysical attributes. While lux refers to the natural light emitted from the sun,
lumen is light as it interacts with the material world, and splendor is reflected light. For
Suger and those who followed in his footsteps, the point was not to simply flood the
entire church with as much light as possible but to harness lux, lumen, and splendor in
specific ways. The addition of the rose window at Saint-Denis is a strong example of
the use of light to guide the viewer's sight to a higher plane, both literally high above,
but also symbolically as a model of the divine realm. The west rose window at Saint-
Denis occupies what MIT Professor of Architecture, Dr. Mark Jarzombek, calls a
“strange space in our architectural imagination,” not simply a producer of light, but “a
floating signifier of Heaven,” (Lecture 21 in A Global History of Architecture via edX).
Underlying these shifts are changing philosophical beliefs that manifested directly in
ecclesiastical architecture. As the Middle Ages seceded to the Renaissance, the
metaphysical conception of light gave way to a more scientific understanding. This
change in the belief of the nature of light was a shift from a literal understanding of light
as the embodiment of divinity, to a symbolic one where light was a representation of the
divine. The way in which light needed to interact with the material world, and the very
way in which the materiality of light itself was portrayed and utilized, changed. As it
became more scientifically and less metaphysically understood, perhaps light became a
metaphor for the divine, as opposed to the real thing. Even so, it is impossible to
understand what the Gothic form meant to the medieval people for whom these
structures were built without first understanding their beliefs concerning light and
materiality that informed and inspired these fascinating and beautiful architectural
developments.
Editorial Review This article has been reviewed for accuracy, reliability and adherence
to academic standards prior to publication.
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Bibliography
A Global History of ArchitectureAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
Artist InfoAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
Basilique cathédrale de Saint-DenisAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
Chartres Cathedral – Cathédrale Notre-Dame de ChartresAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
Rib vault | architectureAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
The West FacadeAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
rose window | Definition, History, & FactsAccessed 8 Dec 2020.
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Scott, Robert A. The Gothic Enterprise. University of California Press, 2011.
Simson, Otto Georg Von. The Gothic Cathedral. Princeton Bollingen, 1974.
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Hillary Smith
Hillary Smith holds master's degrees in Art History (University College Dublin) and
Public Policy (UCLA). Interested in the nexus of art and policy, she is a believer in the
soft power potential of cultural heritage to transform and connect our world.