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It's not just the dark days that have been getting me down (see my last posting). The war in Ukraine, the mass shootings in my own country (USA) are hard to bear. A few days ago somebody even gunned down gay and trans people at a club in Colorado. Just because they are gay or trans, apparently. Russia's Putin may have a similar attitude. Yet his Army is bombing and killing anybody and everybody just because they happen to be Ukrainian. All of this reminds me of the bleak history of human persecution, including what took place in the country that is now my home.
These small stones topped with brass (called stumbling stones) pay tribute to the victims of Nazi persecution and terror here in the city of Bamberg. There are 136 of them, all placed on the sidewalk in front of the homes where the victims lived as part of an art project directed by Gunter Demnig since 2004. 70,000 similar stones can be seen in many locations throughout Germany and Europe. The five stones here on Keßlerstraße contain these inscriptions in German:
Here lived
Isodor Forchheimer, born 1887, imprisoned at Dachau 1938, deported to Riga 1941, murdered.
Johanna Forchheimer, born Michels 1888, deported to Riga 1941, murdered.
Cantor Julius Schapiro, born 1895, arrested, in Buchenwald concentration camp, deceased 1945.
Ruth Schapiro, born 1925, deported to the east 1941, declared to be dead.
Elenore Schapiro, born Hahn 1896, deported to the east 1941, declared to be dead.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolperstein , and (in German) de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Stolpersteine_in_Bamberg and www.stolpersteine-bamberg.de/ I've re-edited this image using the Fuji Monochrome +R filter in Lightroom 6.14. [FUJI1179_lr_2000]
Thank you all for the clicks, comments & faves.
1914 Rolls-Royce Model 40/50HP Silver Ghost Type Torpedo-Skiff (body Schapiro-Schebera, Carrosserie Schebera GmbH, Berlin - Germany)
- 7428cc straight-6 SV engine
- Rolls-Royce carburettor
- 4-speed manual gearbox
- power 50 bhp / 1.500 rpm
- curb weight 1570 kg
- top speed 110 km/h
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art . The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
detail of George Segal's sculpture of Meyer Schapiro [info thanks to Trish Mayo]; "Like Life" exhibit at the Met Breuer museum, New York City. Segal is known for his white figures, and Schapiro was an art historian and critic.
Artist George Segal's sculpture of "Meyer Schapiro", a museum guard and Donatello's "Bust of Niccolo da Uzzano" lined up nicely at the Met Breuer
BREAKING NEWS:NEW YORK ATTACK !!!December 28, 2019 10 pm. JERSEY CITY ATTACK !!! TERROR “premeditated violent antisemitic hate crime” “act of terror” December 10, 2019 12:30 pm (EST; UTC−05:00) USA
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BREAKING NEWS:NEW YORK ATTACK !!!December 28, 2019 10 pm
apnews.com/2846e752d621824a9c2c75a89271c71e
www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50937186
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time.com/5748292/jersey-city-shooting/
time.com/5748418/jersey-city-shooting-victims/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Jersey_City_shooting
www.cnn.com/2019/12/13/us/jersey-city-new-jersey-shooting...
www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50764276
www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/12/12/jersey-city-shoo...
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/12/new-jersey-kosher...
www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/shooters-who-killed-4-jersey...
www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/12/12/jersey-city...
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"YOUR BEST SHOT 2019"
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The unusual coachwork, designed by Ernst Neuman-Neander, was constructed by Karosseriewerke Schapiro - Schebera of Berlin, then this unique Silver Ghost was delivered to its first owner in Brussels. The car later lived in Cairo, Egypt from 1925 to 1956, and it survived there in remarkably preserved condition, due in large part to the region’s dry atmosphere
The Starry Night is an oil-on-canvas painting by the Dutch Post-Impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh. Painted in June 1889, it depicts the view from the east-facing window of his asylum room at Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, just before sunrise, with the addition of an imaginary village. It has been in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City since 1941, acquired through the Lillie P. Bliss Bequest. Widely regarded as Van Gogh's magnum opus, The Starry Night is one of the most recognizable paintings in Western art.
In the aftermath of the 23 December 1888 breakdown that resulted in the self-mutilation of his left ear, Van Gogh voluntarily admitted himself to the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole lunatic asylum on 8 May 1889. Housed in a former monastery, Saint-Paul-de-Mausole catered to the wealthy and was less than half full when Van Gogh arrived, allowing him to occupy not only a second-story bedroom but also a ground-floor room for use as a painting studio.
During the year Van Gogh stayed at the asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, the prolific output of paintings he had begun in Arles continued. During this period, he produced some of the best-known works of his career, including the Irises from May 1889, now in the J. Paul Getty Museum, and the blue self-portrait from September, 1889, in the Musée d'Orsay. The Starry Night was painted mid-June by around 18 June, the date he wrote to his brother Theo to say he had a new study of a starry sky.
Although The Starry Night was painted during the day in Van Gogh's ground-floor studio, it would be inaccurate to state that the picture was painted from memory. The view has been identified as the one from his bedroom window, facing east, a view which Van Gogh painted variations of no fewer than twenty-one times,[citation needed] including The Starry Night. "Through the iron-barred window," he wrote to his brother, Theo, around 23 May 1889, "I can see an enclosed square of wheat ... above which, in the morning, I watch the sun rise in all its glory."
Van Gogh depicted the view at different times of the day and under various weather conditions, such as the sunrise, moonrise, sunshine-filled days, overcast days, windy days, and one day with rain. While the hospital staff did not allow Van Gogh to paint in his bedroom, he was able there to make sketches in ink or charcoal on paper; eventually, he would base newer variations on previous versions. The pictorial element uniting all of these paintings is the diagonal line coming in from the right depicting the low rolling hills of the Alpilles mountains. In fifteen of the twenty-one versions, cypress trees are visible beyond the far wall enclosing the wheat field. Van Gogh exaggerated their size in six of these paintings, most notably in Wheat Field with Cypresses and The Starry Night, bringing the trees closer to the picture plane.
One of the first paintings of the view was Mountainous Landscape Behind Saint-Rémy, now in Copenhagen. Van Gogh made a number of sketches for the painting, of which. The Enclosed Wheatfield After a Storm is typical. It is unclear whether the painting was made in his studio or outside. In his 9 June letter describing it, he mentions he had been working outside for a few days. Van Gogh described the second of the two landscapes he mentions he was working on, in a letter to his sister Wil on 16 June 1889. This is Green Wheat Field with Cypress, now in Prague, and the first painting at the asylum he definitely painted en plein air. Wheatfield, Saint-Rémy de Provence, now in New York, is a study for it. Two days later, Vincent wrote to Theo stating that he had painted "a starry sky".
The Starry Night is the only nocturne in the series of views from his bedroom window. In early June, Vincent wrote to Theo, "This morning I saw the countryside from my window a long time before sunrise with nothing but the morning star, which looked very big". Researchers have determined that Venus (sometimes referred to as the "morning star") was indeed visible at dawn in Provence in the spring of 1889, and was at that time nearly as bright as possible. So the brightest "star" in the painting, just to the viewer's right of the cypress tree, is actually Venus.
The Moon is stylized, as astronomical records indicate that it actually was waning gibbous at the time Van Gogh painted the picture, and even if the phase of the Moon had been its waning crescent at the time, Van Gogh's Moon would not have been astronomically correct. (For other interpretations of the Moon, see below.) The one pictorial element that was definitely not visible from Van Gogh's cell is the village, which is based on a sketch made from a hillside above the village of Saint-Rémy. Pickvance thought F1541v was done later, and the steeple more Dutch than Provençal, a conflation of several Van Gogh had painted and drawn in his Nuenen period, and thus the first of his "reminisces of the North" he was to paint and draw early the following year. Hulsker thought a landscape on the reverse was also a study for the painting.
Despite the large number of letters Van Gogh wrote, he said very little about The Starry Night. After reporting that he had painted a starry sky in June, Van Gogh next mentioned the painting in a letter to Theo on or about 20 September 1889, when he included it in a list of paintings he was sending to his brother in Paris, referring to it as a "night study." Of this list of paintings, he wrote, "All in all the only things I consider a little good in it are the Wheatfield, the Mountain, the Orchard, the Olive trees with the blue hills and the Portrait and the Entrance to the quarry, and the rest says nothing to me"; "the rest" would include The Starry Night. When he decided to hold back three paintings from this batch in order to save money on postage, The Starry Night was one of the paintings he did not send. Finally, in a letter to painter Émile Bernard from late November 1889, Van Gogh referred to the painting as a "failure."
Van Gogh argued with Bernard and especially Paul Gauguin as to whether one should paint from nature, as Van Gogh preferred, or paint what Gauguin called "abstractions": paintings conceived in the imagination, or de tête. In the letter to Bernard, Van Gogh recounted his experiences when Gauguin lived with him for nine weeks in the autumn and winter[clarification needed] of 1888: "When Gauguin was in Arles, I once or twice allowed myself to be led astray into abstraction, as you know. . . . But that was delusion, dear friend, and one soon comes up against a brick wall. . . And yet, once again I allowed myself to be led astray into reaching for stars that are too big—another failure—and I have had my fill of that." Van Gogh here is referring to the expressionistic swirls which dominate the upper center portion of The Starry Night.
Theo referred to these pictorial elements in a letter to Vincent dated 22 October 1889: "I clearly sense what preoccupies you in the new canvases like the village in the moonlight [The Starry Night] or the mountains, but I feel that the search for style takes away the real sentiment of things." Vincent responded in early November, "Despite what you say in your previous letter, that the search for style often harms other qualities, the fact is that I feel myself greatly driven to seek style, if you like, but I mean by that a more manly and more deliberate drawing. If that will make me more like Bernard or Gauguin, I can't do anything about it. But am inclined to believe that in the long run you'd get used to it." And later in the same letter, he wrote, "I know very well that the studies drawn with long, sinuous lines from the last consignment weren't what they ought to become, however I dare urge you to believe that in landscapes one will continue to mass things by means of a drawing style that seeks to express the entanglement of the masses."
But although Van Gogh periodically defended the practices of Gauguin and Bernard, each time he inevitably repudiated them and continued with his preferred method of painting from nature. Like the impressionists he had met in Paris, especially Claude Monet, Van Gogh also favored working in series. He had painted his series of sunflowers in Arles, and he painted the series of cypresses and wheat fields at Saint-Rémy. The Starry Night belongs to this latter series, as well as to a small series of nocturnes he initiated in Arles.
Van Gogh's Starry Night Over the Rhône, 1888, oil on canvas
The nocturne series was limited by the difficulties posed by painting such scenes from nature, i.e., at night. The first painting in the series was Café Terrace at Night, painted in Arles in early September 1888, followed by Starry Night (Over the Rhône) later that same month. Van Gogh's written statements concerning these paintings provide further insight into his intentions for painting night studies in general and The Starry Night in particular.
Soon after his arrival in Arles in February 1888, Van Gogh wrote to Theo, "I need a starry night with cypresses or—perhaps above a field of ripe wheat; there are some really beautiful nights here." That same week, he wrote to Bernard, "A starry sky is something I should like to try to do, just as in the daytime I am going to try to paint a green meadow spangled with dandelions." He compared the stars to dots on a map and mused that, as one takes a train to travel on Earth, "we take death to reach a star." Although at this point in his life Van Gogh was disillusioned by religion, he appears not to have lost his belief in an afterlife. He voiced this ambivalence in a letter to Theo after having painted Starry Night Over the Rhône, confessing to a "tremendous need for, shall I say the word—for religion—so I go outside at night to paint the stars."
He wrote about existing in another dimension after death and associated this dimension with the night sky. "It would be so simple and would account so much for the terrible things in life, which now amaze and wound us so, if life had yet another hemisphere, invisible it is true, but where one lands when one dies. "Hope is in the stars," he wrote, but he was quick to point out that "earth is a planet too, and consequently a star, or celestial orb." And he stated flatly that The Starry Night was "not a return to the romantic or to religious ideas."
Noted art historian Meyer Schapiro highlights the expressionistic aspects of The Starry Night, saying it was created under the "pressure of feeling" and that it is a "visionary [painting] inspired by a religious mood." Schapiro theorizes that the "hidden content" of the work makes reference to the New Testament Book of Revelation, revealing an "apocalyptic theme of the woman in pain of birth, girded with the sun and moon and crowned with stars, whose newborn child is threatened by the dragon." (Schapiro, in the same volume, also professes to see an image of a mother and child in the clouds in Landscape with Olive Trees, painted at the same time and often regarded as a pendant to The Starry Night.)
Art historian Sven Loevgren expands on Schapiro's approach, again calling The Starry Night a "visionary painting" which "was conceived in a state of great agitation." He writes of the "hallucinatory character of the painting and its violently expressive form," although he takes pains to note that the painting was not executed during one of Van Gogh's incapacitating breakdowns. Loevgren compares Van Gogh's "religiously inclined longing for the beyond" to the poetry of Walt Whitman. He calls The Starry Night "an infinitely expressive picture which symbolizes the final absorption of the artist by the cosmos" and which "gives a never-to-be-forgotten sensation of standing on the threshold of eternity." Loevgren praises Schapiro's "eloquent interpretation" of the painting as an apocalyptic vision and advances his own symbolist theory with reference to the eleven stars in one of Joseph's dreams in the Old Testament Book of Genesis. Loevgren asserts that the pictorial elements of The Starry Night "are visualized in purely symbolic terms" and notes that "the cypress is the tree of death in the Mediterranean countries."
The drawing Cypresses in Starry Night, a reed pen copy executed by Van Gogh after the painting in 1889. Originally held at Kunsthalle Bremen, today part of the disputed Baldin Collection.
Art historian Lauren Soth also finds a symbolist subtext in The Starry Night, saying that the painting is a "traditional religious subject in disguise" and a "sublimated image of [Van Gogh's] deepest religious feelings." Citing Van Gogh's avowed admiration for the paintings of Eugène Delacroix, and especially the earlier painter's use of Prussian blue and citron yellow in paintings of Christ, Soth theorizes that Van Gogh used these colors to represent Christ in The Starry Night. He criticizes Schapiro's and Loevgren's biblical interpretations, dependent as they are on a reading of the crescent moon as incorporating elements of the Sun. He says it is merely a crescent moon, which, he writes, also had symbolic meaning for Van Gogh, representing "consolation."
It is in light of such symbolist interpretations of The Starry Night that art historian Albert Boime presents his study of the painting. As noted above, Boime has proven that the painting depicts not only the topographical elements of Van Gogh's view from his asylum window but also the celestial elements, identifying not only Venus but also the constellation Aries. He suggests that Van Gogh originally intended to paint a gibbous Moon but "reverted to a more traditional image" of the crescent moon, and theorizes that the bright aureole around the resulting crescent is a remnant of the original gibbous version. He recounts Van Gogh's interest in the writings of Victor Hugo and Jules Verne as possible inspiration for his belief in an afterlife on stars or planets. And he provides a detailed discussion of the well-publicized advances in astronomy that took place during Van Gogh's lifetime.
Boime asserts that while Van Gogh never mentioned astronomer Camille Flammarion in his letters, he believes that Van Gogh must have been aware of Flammarion's popular illustrated publications, which included drawings of spiral nebulae (as galaxies were then called) as seen and photographed through telescopes. Boime interprets the swirling figure in the central portion of the sky in The Starry Night to represent either a spiral galaxy or a comet, photographs of which had also been published in popular media. He asserts that the only non-realistic elements of the painting are the village and the swirls in the sky. These swirls represent Van Gogh's understanding of the cosmos as a living, dynamic place.
Harvard astronomer Charles A. Whitney conducted his own astronomical study of The Starry Night contemporaneously with but independent of Boime (who spent almost his entire career at U.C.L.A.). While Whitney does not share Boime's certainty with regard to the constellation Aries, he concurs with Boime on the visibility of Venus in Provence at the time the painting was executed. He also sees the depiction of a spiral galaxy in the sky, although he gives credit for the original to Anglo-Irish astronomer William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse, whose work Flammarion reproduced.
Sketch of the Whirlpool Galaxy by Lord Rosse in 1845, 44 years before Van Gogh's painting
Whitney also theorizes that the swirls in the sky could represent wind, evoking the mistral that had such a profound effect on Van Gogh during the twenty-seven months he spent in Provence. (It was the mistral which triggered his first breakdown after entering the asylum, in July 1889, less than a month after painting The Starry Night.) Boime theorizes that the lighter shades of blue just above the horizon show the first light of morning.
The village has been variously identified as either a recollection of Van Gogh's Dutch homeland, or based on a sketch he made of the town of Saint-Rémy. In either case, it is an imaginary component of the picture, not visible from the window of the asylum bedroom.
Cypress trees have long been associated with death in European culture, though the question of whether Van Gogh intended for them to have such a symbolic meaning in The Starry Night is the subject of an open debate. In an April 1888 letter to Bernard, Van Gogh referred to "funereal cypresses," though this is possibly similar to saying "stately oaks" or "weeping willows." One week after painting The Starry Night, he wrote to his brother Theo, "The cypresses are always occupying my thoughts. I should like to make something of them like the canvases of the sunflowers, because it astonishes me that they have not yet been done as I see them." In the same letter he mentioned "two studies of cypresses of that difficult shade of bottle green." These statements suggest that Van Gogh was interested in the trees more for their formal qualities than for their symbolic connotation.
Schapiro refers to the cypress in the painting as a "vague symbol of a human striving." Boime calls it the "symbolic counterpart of Van Gogh's own striving for the Infinite through non-orthodox channels." Art historian Vojtech Jirat-Wasiutynski says that for Van Gogh the cypresses "function as rustic and natural obelisks" providing a "link between the heavens and the earth." (Some commentators see one tree, others see two or more.) Loevgren reminds the reader that "the cypress is the tree of death in the Mediterranean countries."
Art historian Ronald Pickvance says that with "its arbitrary collage of separate motifs," The Starry Night "is overtly stamped as an 'abstraction'." Pickvance claims that cypress trees were not visible facing east from Van Gogh's room, and he includes them with the village and the swirls in the sky as products of Van Gogh's imagination.Boime asserts that the cypresses were visible in the east, as does Jirat-Wasiutyński. Van Gogh biographers Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith concur, saying that Van Gogh "telescoped" the view in certain of the pictures of the view from his window, and it stands to reason that Van Gogh would do this in a painting featuring the Morning Star. Such a compression of depth serves to enhance the brightness of the planet.
Soth uses Van Gogh's statement to his brother, that The Starry Night is "an exaggeration from the point of view of arrangement" to further his argument that the painting is "an amalgam of images." However, it is by no means certain that Van Gogh was using "arrangement" as a synonym for "composition." Van Gogh was, in fact, speaking of three paintings, one of which was The Starry Night, when he made this comment: "The olive trees with white cloud and background of mountains, as well as the Moonrise and the Night effect," as he called it, "these are exaggerations from the point of view of the arrangement, their lines are contorted like those of the ancient woodcuts." The first two pictures are universally acknowledged to be realistic, non-composite views of their subjects. What the three pictures do have in common is exaggerated color and brushwork of the type that Theo referred to when he criticized Van Gogh for his "search for style [that] takes away the real sentiment of things" in The Starry Night.
On two other occasions around this time, Van Gogh used the word "arrangement" to refer to color, similar to the way James Abbott McNeill Whistler used the term. In a letter to Gauguin in January 1889, he wrote, "As an arrangement of colours: the reds moving through to pure oranges, intensifying even more in the flesh tones up to the chromes, passing into the pinks and marrying with the olive and Veronese greens. As an impressionist arrangement of colours, I’ve never devised anything better." (The painting he is referring to is La Berceuse, which is a realistic portrait of Augustine Roulin with an imaginative floral background.) And to Bernard in late November 1889: "But this is enough for you to understand that I would long to see things of yours again, like the painting of yours that Gauguin has, those Breton women walking in a meadow, the arrangement of which is so beautiful, the colour so naively distinguished. Ah, you’re exchanging that for something—must one say the word—something artificial—something affected."
While stopping short of calling the painting a hallucinatory vision, Naifeh and Smith discuss The Starry Night in the context of Van Gogh's mental illness, which they identify as temporal lobe epilepsy, or latent epilepsy. "Not the kind," they write, "known since antiquity, that caused the limbs to jerk and the body to collapse ('the falling sickness', as it was sometimes called), but a mental epilepsy—a seizing up of the mind: a collapse of thought, perception, reason, and emotion that manifested itself entirely in the brain and often prompted bizarre, dramatic behavior." Symptoms of the seizures "resembled fireworks of electrical impulses in the brain."
Van Gogh experienced his second breakdown in seven months in July 1889. Naifeh and Smith theorize that the seeds of this breakdown were present when Van Gogh painted The Starry Night, that in giving himself over to his imagination "his defenses had been breached." On that day in mid-June, in a "state of heightened reality," with all the other elements of the painting in place, Van Gogh threw himself into the painting of the stars, producing, they write, "a night sky unlike any other the world had ever seen with ordinary eyes."
A 3-story sculpture named “Anna & David” (we’re looking at David here) on Wilson Boulevard, Arlington, Virginia. Public art by Miriam Schapiro. Photo: 26 March 2023.
Belem, Berardo Collection, Centro Cultural de Belem, Lisbon, Portugal
Materials : Oil on canvas
BIOGRAPHY
FROM WIKIPEDIA, THE FREE ENCYCLOPAEDIA
Kurt Leopold Seligmann (1900–1962) was a Swiss-American Surrealist painter and engraver. He was known for his fantastic imagery of medieval troubadors and knights engaged in macabre rituals and inspired partially by the carnival held annually in his native Basel, Switzerland.
LIFE AND CAREER
He was born in Basel, in 1900, the son of a successful furniture department store owner. His parents were not in favor of his artistic aspirations but eventually relented. After study at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Geneva and several unhappy years working in his father's business in Basel, Seligmann left for Paris where he looked up his old friends from Geneva, sculptor Alberto Giacometti and art critic Pierre Courthion. During this time he also met Ivy Langton (who may have become an artist due to inspiration from Kurt). Through Giacometti he met Hans Arp and Jean Helion, who admired his sinister biomorphic paintings and invited him to join their group, Abstraction-Creation Art Non-Figuratif. In the mid-1930s his work began to take on a more baroque aspect, as he animated the prancing figures in his paintings and etchings with festoons of ribbons, drapery, and heraldic paraphernalia.
It was about this time (1935) that he met and married Arlette Paraf, a granddaughter of the founder of the Wildenstein Gallery, which had locations in Paris, London, and New York. Together they traveled extensively, first around the world during a year-long honey-moon trip in 1936 and then to North America and British Columbia (1938) to satisfy their interest in American ethnographic art. In 1937, Seligmann was accepted as a formal member of the Surrealist group in Paris by André Breton, who collected his work and included him in Surrealist exhibitions.
At the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, Seligmann was the first European Surrealist to arrive in New York, ostensibly for an exhibition of his work being held at the Karl Nierendorf Gallery. Once there, however, with these artists being especial targets of the Nazis, he began a concerted effort to aid his Surrealist colleagues left behind in France and to bring them to safety. The copius correspondence he maintained during this difficult period is preserved in a collection at the Beinicke Rare Book Library at Yale University.
Seligmann's art continued to evolve and reached maturity during the 1940s in the United States, where he did his best work. Beginning in 1940, he and Arlette lived at the Beaux Arts Building at Fortieth Street in Manhattan, and later they acquired a farm north of the city in the hamlet of Sugar Loaf, in Orange County, New York. Seligmann befriended many American artists and became a close friend of the art historian, Meyer Schapiro. With Schapiro as author, in 1944 he produced a limited edition set of six etchings illustrating the Myth of Oedipus, surely his masterpiece in this medium and one of the greatest works of Surrealist printmaking. As the Surrealists' expert on magic, he also wrote a history of it, The Mirror of Magic (Pantheon Books, 1948). Mythology and esoterica always infused the fascinating and turbulent imagery of his "dance macabre" paintings. His work then began to be exhibited widely and acquired by museums throughout the United States and Europe after the war.
Seligmann taught for many years at various colleges in New York City, particularly at Brooklyn College, from which he retired in 1958. The changing nature of the New York art world, as it embraced Abstract Expressionism, caused his work to be relegated to past art history and become perceived as passé. Due to illness, he gave up his Manhattan apartment and retired to his farm, where he died of an accidentally self-inflicted gunshot wound in January 1962.
Shortly before her death in 1992, his widow, Arlette Seligmann, bequeathed the entire Seligmann estate to the Orange Country Citizens Foundation, a private nonprofit corporation dedicated to the preservation of Orange County, New York. The foundation now serves as Seligmann's official estate and uses the Seligmann's 55-acre (220,000 m2) farm as their office. The U.S. copyright representative for the Orange County Citizen's Foundation and the estate of Kurt Seligmann is the Artists Rights Society.
At the request of the Orange County Citizens Foundation, etching and collage artist, Jonathan Talbot, undertook the restoration of the etching press formerly owned by Kurt Seligmann, which is located on the Seligmann property in Sugar Loaf. The project is expected to be completed by August 2011.
The Nu River Landing residential condominium located right alongside the New River in beautiful downtown Fort Lauderdale.
Most of the 409 units here at Nu River Landing feature downtown and river views, quality contemporary finishes, floor to ceiling windows. The property also features basketball and racquetball courts, billiards, a roof-top heated pool, a sauna, state of the art fitness center, and much more.
Nu River Landing is within walking distance of the Las Olas Blvd entertainment district, Broward Performing Arts Center, and River Walk. Tenants can hop on the water taxi and ride to the beach or any of the other stops along the scenic Intracoastal waterway.
Credit for the data above is given to the following websites:
www.highrises.com/fort-lauderdale/nu-river-landing-condos/
www.emporis.com/buildings/133986/nuriver-landings-fort-la...
© All Rights Reserved - you may not use this image in any form without my prior permission.
The Nu River Landing residential condominium located right alongside the New River in beautiful downtown Fort Lauderdale.
Most of the 409 units here at Nu River Landing feature downtown and river views, quality contemporary finishes, floor to ceiling windows. The property also features basketball and racquetball courts, billiards, a roof-top heated pool, a sauna, state of the art fitness center, and much more.
Nu River Landing is within walking distance of the Las Olas Blvd entertainment district, Broward Performing Arts Center, and River Walk. Tenants can hop on the water taxi and ride to the beach or any of the other stops along the scenic Intracoastal waterway.
Credit for the data above is given to the following websites:
www.highrises.com/fort-lauderdale/nu-river-landing-condos/
www.emporis.com/buildings/133986/nuriver-landings-fort-la...
© All Rights Reserved - you may not use this image in any form without my prior permission.
The Nu River Landing residential condominium located right along side the New River in beautiful downtown Fort Lauderdale.
Most of 409 units here at Nu River Landing feature downtown and river views, quality contemporary finishes, floor to ceiling windows. The property also features basketball and racquetball courts, billiards, roof-top heated pool, sauna, state of the art fitness center and much more.
Nu River Landing is within walking distance of the Las Olas Blvd entertainment district, Broward Performing Arts Center and River Walk. Tenants can hop on the water taxi and ride to the beach or the many of the other stops along the scenic intracoastal waterway.
Credit for the data above is given to the following websites:
www.highrises.com/fort-lauderdale/nu-river-landing-condos/
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El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
Belem, Berardo Collection, Centro Cultural de Belem, Lisbon, Portugal
Material: Oil on plywood
Collection: Berardo Collection
BIOGRAPHY
NATIONALITY:SWISS-AMERICAN
KNOWN FOR: PAINTING
MOVEMENT: SURREALISM
Kurt Leopold Seligmann (1900–1962) was a Swiss-American Surrealist painter and engraver. He was known for his fantastic imagery of medieval troubadors and knights engaged in macabre rituals and inspired partially by the carnival held annually in his native Basel, Switzerland.
Life and career[edit]
He was born in Basel, in 1900, the son of a successful furniture department store owner. His parents were not in favor of his artistic aspirations but eventually relented. After study at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Geneva and several unhappy years working in his father's business in Basel, Seligmann left for Paris where he looked up his old friends from Geneva, sculptor Alberto Giacometti and art critic Pierre Courthion. During this time he also met Ivy Langton[1] (who may have become an artist due to inspiration from Kurt). Through Giacometti he met Hans Arp and Jean Helion, who admired his sinister biomorphic paintings and invited him to join their group, Abstraction-Creation Art Non-Figuratif. In the mid-1930s his work began to take on a more baroque aspect, as he animated the prancing figures in his paintings and etchings with festoons of ribbons, drapery, and heraldic paraphernalia.
It was about this time (1935) that he met and married Arlette Paraf, a granddaughter of the founder of the Wildenstein Gallery, which had locations in Paris, London, and New York. Together they traveled extensively, first around the world during a year-long honey-moon trip in 1936 and then to North America and British Columbia (1938) to satisfy their interest in American ethnographic art. In 1937, Seligmann was accepted as a formal member of the Surrealist group in Paris by André Breton, who collected his work and included him in Surrealist exhibitions.
At the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, Seligmann was the first European Surrealist to arrive in New York, ostensibly for an exhibition of his work being held at the Karl Nierendorf Gallery. Once there, however, with these artists being especial targets of the Nazis, he began a concerted effort to aid his Surrealist colleagues left behind in France and to bring them to safety. The copious correspondence he maintained during this difficult period is preserved in a collection at the Beinicke Rare Book Library at Yale University.
Seligmann's art continued to evolve and reached maturity during the 1940s in the United States, where he did his best work. Beginning in 1940, he and Arlette lived at the Beaux Arts Building at Fortieth Street in Manhattan, and later they acquired a farm north of the city in the hamlet of Sugar Loaf, New York (in Orange County). Seligmann befriended many American artists and became a close friend of the art historian, Meyer Schapiro. With Schapiro as author, in 1944 he produced a limited edition set of six etchings illustrating the Myth of Oedipus, surely his masterpiece in this medium and one of the greatest works of Surrealist printmaking. As the Surrealists' expert on magic, he also wrote a history of it, The History of Magic (Pantheon Books, 1948). Mythology and esoterica always infused the fascinating and turbulent imagery of his "dance macabre" paintings. His work then began to be exhibited widely and acquired by museums throughout the United States and Europe after the war.
Seligmann taught for many years at various colleges in New York City, particularly at Brooklyn College, from which he retired in 1958. The changing nature of the New York art world, as it embraced Abstract Expressionism, caused his work to be relegated to past art history and become perceived as passé. Due to illness, he gave up his Manhattan apartment and retired to his farm, where he died of an accidentally self-inflicted gunshot wound in January 1962.
Shortly before her death in 1992, his widow, Arlette Seligmann, bequeathed the entire Seligmann estate to the Orange Country Citizens Foundation, a private nonprofit corporation dedicated to the preservation of Orange County, New York. The foundation now serves as Seligmann's official estate and uses the Seligmann's 55-acre (220,000 m2) farm as their office.[2] The U.S. copyright representative for the Orange County Citizen's Foundation and the estate of Kurt Seligmann is the Artists Rights Society.[3]
At the request of the Orange County Citizens Foundation, etching and collage artist, Jonathan Talbot, undertook the restoration of the etching press formerly owned by Kurt Seligmann, which is located on the Seligmann property in Sugar Loaf. The project is expected to be completed by August 2011.
"FAMILY BUSINESS",
-Ausstellungsbeitrag/(Detail): Anna Schapiro,
Moskau/Berlin, Centrum Judaicum, Neue Syangoge Berlin
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
El Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos es una abadía benedictina ubicada en la parte oriental de un pequeño valle, que el primer documento del Archivo de Silos, del año 954, ya lo denomina valle de Tapadillo perteneciente al municipio de Santo Domingo de Silos, en la provincia de Burgos, comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León, España. Se halla comunicado por tres carreteras secundarias que desembocan, por Aranda de Duero y por Lerma, con la nacional A-1, y por Hacinas, con la N-234. Su claustro es una de las obras maestras del románico español.
El monasterio, aunque no en su actual configuración, se remonta a la época visigótica (siglo VII), si bien se desvanece durante la ocupación musulmana. En el siglo X, llamado aún San Sebastián de Silos, y en especial durante el periodo en que el conde Fernán González gobierna en Castilla (930-970), vuelve a resurgir la comunidad monástica alcanzando un pujante actividad que nuevamente decae bajo las razias de Almanzor. Desaparecido este en 1002 y recobrada la serenidad, el monasterio se encuentra arruinado y maltrecho. Cuando en 1041 Domingo, prior del monasterio de San Millán de la Cogolla, se refugia en Castilla huyendo del rey de Navarra, es bien recibido por el monarca leonés Fernando I que le confía la misión de restablecer el antiguo esplendor y dar nuevo auge al monasterio de Silos puesto bajo la advocación de San Sebastián. Con el decidido impulso de Santo Domingo como abad del cenobio se erigió la iglesia románica, magnífico templo de tres naves y cinco ábsides consagrado en 1088 por el abad Fortunio, el claustro que aún perdura, y el resto de las dependencias monacales. A la muerte del santo, el monasterio toma su patrocinio y pasa a denominarse Santo Domingo de Silos.
Hacia 1170, la dama de origen noble Juana de Aza, que estaba encinta, peregrina a Silos en busca de dirección espiritual. Su hijo, Domingo de Guzmán será bautizado así en honor del santo patrono de la abadía.
El claustro de Silos es de doble planta, siendo la inferior la más antigua y la de mayor mérito. Forma un cuadrilátero de lados ligeramente desiguales, de los que el menor mide 30 m y el mayor 33,12 m. Los lados norte y sur constan de 16 arcos, mientras que los lados este y oeste de sólo 14. Como las parejas de lados opuestos no son de igual dimensión a pesar de tener el mismo número de arcos, las luces de éstos tampoco son idénticas, variando entre 1,00 y 1,15 m. Los arcos son de medio punto y descansan sobre capiteles que, a su vez, lo hacen sobre columnas de doble fuste monolítico de 1,15 m de longitud; sólo los soportes centrales de cada galería están formados por fustes quíntuples, salvo uno de ellos, el del lado norte, que es cuádruple y torsado. Toda la arquería va montada sobre un podio corrido con una abertura para acceder al jardín interior.
El claustro inferior debió levantarse entre la segunda mitad del siglo XI y primera del XII, mientras que el claustro superior se construyó en los últimos años de ese mismo siglo. En el inferior se perciben claramente dos fases de ejecución: durante la primera, que corresponde a las últimas décadas del siglo XI, se llevaron a cabo las galerías norte y este; la segunda se desarrolló en el siguiente siglo y en ella se ejecutaron las galerías sur y oeste. Cada fase refleja una forma de hacer y un estilo diferentes atribuibles a dos maestros distintos que emplearon sus propios talleres. Como rasgos diferenciadores, los fustes de las columnas de la primera etapa están más separados y presentan mayor éntasis, y las tallas son de poco relieve y escaso movimiento. Las figuras del segundo taller son más realistas y poseen mayor volumen.
En el plano artístico lo más destacable es la colección de los 64 capiteles de que consta el claustro bajo y los relieves que ornamentan las caras interiores de las cuatro pilastras que forman los ángulos de la galería.
Los capiteles, y en especial los del segundo artista, son obras maestras de la iconografía románica y es lo que más se admira y llama la atención de todo el claustro. Sus temas son muy variados: desde los que representan escenas bíblicas o evangélicas, hasta los figurativos de animales quiméricos, grifos, leones, arpías, centauros, aves fabulosas y toda clase de elementos vegetales.
Son de destacar también la Puerta de las Vírgenes, que comunica el claustro con la iglesia y que constituye un vestigio del primitivo templo románico, y la fachada de la desaparecida sala capitular que se abría a la galería oriental, así como el artesonado mudéjar ricamente decorado con cerca de 700 figuras y escenas de la Castilla de los siglos XIV y XV.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Santo_Domingo_de_Silos
Santo Domingo de Silos Abbey (Spanish: Abadía del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos) is a Benedictine monastery in the village of Santo Domingo de Silos in the southern part of Burgos Province in northern Spain. The monastery is named after the eleventh-century saint Dominic of Silos.
The monastery dates back to the Visigothic period of the 7th century. In the 10th century, the abbey was called San Sebastián de Silos, but acquired its current name when Dominic of Silos was entrusted to renovate the abbey by Fernando the Great, King of Castile and León. Dominic had been prior of the Monasteries of San Millán de la Cogolla before being driven out with two of his fellow monks by King García Sánchez III of Navarre, for opposing the king's intention to annex the monastery's lands.
The two-storey cloister of the monastery, which has large capitals with carved scenes, and also relief panels, is considered a masterpiece of Romanesque art, and has been written about extensively, notably by Meyer Schapiro in his Romanesque Art (1977). The capitals in the lower cloister are decorated with dragons, centaurs, lattices, and mermaids. There is also an important Romanesque free-standing enthroned Madonna and Child. The cloisters are the only surviving part of the monastery that hasn't changed since its inception. The cloister is an angled rectangular shape with 16 semi-circular arches on the north and south sides and 14 semi-circular arches on the west and east sides. The lower storey was begun during the last quarter of the 11th century and completed in the second half of the 12th century. The lower storey's date derives from an epitaph of the eponymous Santo Domingo, who died in 1073, which is located on the abacus of a group of four capitals in the north gallery. The cloister was dedicated on September 29, 1088. Additionally, the upper story of the cloister, which was placed upon the wooden vaulting of the first story, was completed during the 12th century.
Abbot Domingo's successor, Abbot Fortunius was in charge of the construction of the north gallery and the original west gallery. After completion of two of the galleries and the beginning stages of construction of a third gallery, Fortunius was forced to halt construction on the cloister due to the influx of pilgrims coming to visit Abbot Domingo's shrine. Additionally, construction on the cloister was halted for several decades because of political and economic difficulties during the period of 1109 to 1120. As a result of this interruption, it is clear that the west and south galleries are of a different style than the east and north galleries, which seem to indicate that a second, different workshop was hired after the intermission in construction to finish the work on the cloister.
The organization of the cloister consists of four squared-off piers at each corner and paired columns running along each of the arcades. The arcades are mounted atop a podium that extends along each side of the cloister. Each of the sides of the cloister has a grouping of four columns located at the center of the arcade. The six-foot-tall piers have medium-relief sculptural biblical scenes of the Post-Passion which are the Three Marys Discovering Jesus Christ is Gone, the Pentecost, the Doubting Thomas, and the Road to Emmaus. Originally, these religious scenes were painted in bright colors. These pier carvings are dated to the middle of the twelfth century and are the work of the sculptor of the lower story capitals. The carved panels are thought to be the work of the same craftsman who worked on the Abbey of St. Pierre de Moissac in France.
The southeast corner's pier relief depicts the Ascension and the Pentecost. The northeast corner's pier relief depicts the Entombment and the Descent from the Cross. The northwest corner's pier relief depicts the disciples of Emmaus. The southwest corner's pier reliefs depict the Annunciation to Mary and the Tree of Jesse.
The paired columns along each side of the cloister each share a capital. Each capital's decoration is unique, and they contain a variety of animals, foliage or an abstract design. Due to the later date of their creation, the capitals on the second story of the cloister depict narrative scenes. All of the east gallery's capitals and most of the capitals in the north gallery were carved by the same sculptural workshop. The east gallery was the first to be finished, and it was followed by the completion of the north gallery. After the intermission of construction on the cloister, work was resumed in 1158. The south gallery was completed soon after, and the newly reconstructed west gallery was the last side of the cloister to be finished. Before the west gallery was completed, plans were made to construct the second story of the cloister. It is believed that the lower story's sculptural style is of better quality than that of the upper story.
The monks of Silos became internationally famous for singing Gregorian chant as a result of the remarkable success of their 1994 album Chant, one of a number of recordings they have made. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200 music chart, and was certified as triple platinum, becoming the best-selling album of Gregorian chant ever released. It was followed by Chant Noël: Chants for the Holiday Season (also released in 1994) and Chant II (1995). Technically, the Silos monks are surpassed by other choirs, but they are undoubtedly authentic in the sense that they sing Gregorian chant as part of their daily worship. As a reviewer in Gramophone puts it: "The ensemble is not always perfect, but if these are not professional singers, they are, and they sound like, truly professional monks."
Along with Ensemble Organum, the monks of Silos are also one of the few choirs to have recorded Mozarabic chant, for example on a 1970 album for German early music/baroque label Archiv Produktion.
The cloisters and pharmacy are open to the public. Visitors are also able to attend services such as vespers in the abbey church. Access to the library is restricted to researchers.
British postcard by Memory Card, no. 532. Photo: Steve Schapiro. Harvey Keitel and Robert de Niro in Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976).
Legendary American actor Robert De Niro (1943) has starred in such classic films as Taxi Driver (1976), Novecento/1900 (1978), The Deer Hunter (1978), Awakenings (1990) and GoodFellas (1990). His role in The Godfather: Part II (1974) brought him his first Academy Award, and he scored his second Oscar for his portrayal of Jake La Motta in Raging Bull (1980). De Niro worked with many acclaimed film directors, including Brian DePalma, Francis Coppola, Elia Kazan, Bernardo Bertolucci and, most importantly, Martin Scorsese. He also appeared in French, British and Italian films.
Robert Anthony De Niro was born in the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan, New York City in 1943. His mother, Virginia Admiral, was a cerebral and gifted painter, and his father, Robert De Niro Sr., was a painter, sculptor and poet whose work received high critical acclaim. They split ways in 1945 when young Robert was only 2 years old after his father announced that he was gay. De Niro was raised primarily by his mother, who took on work as a typesetter and printer in order to support her son. A bright and energetic child, Robert De Niro was incredibly fond of attending films with his father when they spent time together. De Niro's mother worked part-time as a typist and copyeditor for Maria Piscator's Dramatic Workshop, and as part of her compensation, De Niro was allowed to take children's acting classes for free. At the age of 10, De Niro made his stage debut as the Cowardly Lion in a school production of The Wizard of Oz. De Niro proved to be uninterested in school altogether and, as a teenager, joined a rather tame street gang in Little Italy that gave him the nickname Bobby Milk, in reference to his pale complexion. While De Niro was by all accounts only a very modest troublemaker, the gang provided him with the experience to skilfully portray Italian mobsters as an actor. He left school at age 16 to study acting at Stella Adler Conservatory. Adler, who had taught Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger, was a strong proponent of the Stanislavski method of acting, involving deep psychological character investigation. He studied briefly with Lee Strasberg at the Actor's Studio in New York City and then began auditioning. After a momentary cameo in the French film Trois chambres à Manhattan/Three Rooms in Manhattan (Marcel Carné, 1965), De Niro's real film debut came in Greetings (Brian De Palma, 1968). However, De Niro's first film role already came at the age of 20, when he appeared credited as Robert Denero in De Palma’s The Wedding Party (Brian De Palma, Wilford Leach, 1963), but the film was not released until 1969. He then appeared in Roger Corman's film Bloody Mama (1970), featuring Shelley Winters. His breakthrough performances came a few years later in two highly acclaimed films: the sports drama Bang the Drum Slowly (John D. Hancock, 1973), in which he played a terminally ill catcher on a baseball team, and the crime film Mean Streets (1973), his first of many collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, in which he played street thug Johnny Boy opposite Harvey Keitel.
Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese worked successfully together on eight films: Mean Streets (1973), Taxi Driver (1976), New York, New York (1977), Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Goodfellas (1990), Cape Fear (1991), and Casino (1995). In 1974, De Niro established himself as one of America’s finest actors with his Academy Award-winning portrayal of the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather: Part II (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974), a role for which he learned to speak Sicilian. Two years later, De Niro delivered perhaps the most chilling performance of his career, playing vengeful cabbie Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976) alongside Jodie Foster. His iconic performance as Travis Bickle catapulted him to stardom and forever linked his name with Bickle's famous "You talkin' to me?" monologue, which De Niro largely improvised. In Italy, De Niro appeared opposite Gérard Dépardieu in the epic historical drama Novecento/1900 (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1976). The film is an exploration of life in Italy in the first half of the 20th century, seen through the eyes of two Italian childhood friends on opposite sides of society's hierarchy. He also starred in The Last Tycoon (1976), the last film directed by Elia Kazan. The Hollywood drama is based upon Harold Pinter's screenplay adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon, De Niro continued to show his tremendous skill as a dramatic actor in the Vietnam war drama The Deer Hunter (Michael Cimino, 1978). The film follows a group of friends haunted by their Vietnam experiences. De Niro later portrayed middleweight boxer Jake LaMotta in the commercially unsuccessful but critically adored film Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980). The previously skinny De Niro had put on 60 pounds of muscle for his riveting turn as LaMotta and was rewarded for his dedication with the 1981 Academy Award for Best Actor.
In the 1980s, Robert De Niro's first roles were as a worldly ambitious Catholic priest in True Confessions (Ulu Grosbard, 1981), an aspiring stand-up comedian in Scorsese's The King of Comedy (Martin Scorsese, 1983), and a Jewish mobster in the sprawling historical epic Once Upon a Time in America (Sergio Leone, 1984). Other notable projects included the Sci-Fi art film Brazil (Terry Gilliam, 1985) and the British drama The Mission (Roland Joffé, 1986), about the experiences of a Jesuit missionary in 18th century South America, which won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. It was followed by fare like the crime drama The Untouchables (Brian De Palma, 1987), in which De Niro portrayed gangster Al Capone opposite Kevin Costner as Eliot Ness, the mysterious thriller Angel Heart (Alan Parker, 1987), and the action-comedy Midnight Run (Martin Brest, 1988). De Niro opened the 1990s with Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990), yet another acclaimed gangster film from Scorsese that saw the actor teaming up with Ray Liotta and Joe Pesci. De Niro next starred in a project that earned him another Oscar nomination, portraying a catatonic patient brought back to awareness in Awakenings (Penny Marshall, 1990), co-starring Robin Williams as a character based on physician Oliver Sacks. Dramas continued to be the genre of choice for De Niro, as he played a blacklisted director in Guilty by Suspicion (Irwin Winkler, 1991) and a fire chief in Backdraft (Ron Howard, 1991). Soon afterwards, the actor was once again front and centre and reunited with Scorsese in a terrifying way, bulking up to become a tattooed rapist who stalks a family in Cape Fear (Martin Scorsese, 1991). The film was a remake of the 1962 thriller starring Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum. Peck and Mitchum made appearances in the remake as well. De Niro received his sixth Academy Award nomination for Fear, with the film becoming the highest-grossing collaboration between the actor and Scorsese, earning more than $182 million worldwide. After somewhat edgy, comedic outings like Night and the City (1992) and Mad Dog and Glory (1993), another drama followed in the form of This Boy's Life (Michael Caton-Jones, 1993), in which De Niro portrayed the abusive stepfather of a young Leonardo DiCaprio.