The two convents he founded there were looted and dispersed by Moorish raiding parties in the 8th century, and a hilltop convent was burnt by Norman raiders. The lower tympanum compartments are an expression of this newfound solidarity. This facade can be seen as the foundation for many other buildings, including both French and English Gothic churches. (1130s)

The building stone was often used in comparatively small and irregular pieces, bedded in thick mortar. Benedict had ordered that all the arts were to be taught and practiced in the monasteries. Colonnettes and attached shafts are also used structurally and for decoration. The figure of Christ is highly formalised in both posture and treatment. The most simple form that this takes is to have a column between each adjoining pier. The earliest intact figures are five prophet windows at Augsburg, dating from the late 11th century. Within the monasteries books were transcribed by hand, and few people outside the monasteries could read or write.In France, Burgundy was the centre of monasticism. A number of Romanesque churches are roofed with a series of Domes. This most frequently took a purely geometric form and was particularly applied to mouldings, both straight courses and the curved moldings of arches. Bishops and the abbots of important monasteries lived and functioned like princes. architectural style that dominated in Western Europe in the 11th and 12th centuries In many churches the eastern end has been rebuilt in a later style.

388 Where buildings were constructed of stone that was suitable for carving, many decorative details occur, including ornate capitals and mouldings. The monasteries were the major seats of learning of all sorts. The square-topped doorway is surmounted by a mosaic.

In northern France, two large towers, such as those at Caen, were to become an integral part of the facade of any large abbey or cathedral. They include the The characters in the lower Vézelay compartments are regal and well proportioned. Among the many examples that exist, one of the finest is the figure of the Many of the smaller sculptural works, particularly capitals, are Biblical in subject and include scenes of The tympanum of the inner portal of la Madeleine Vezelay has the scene of Christ in Majesty, at the Last Judgement. A characteristic feature of Romanesque architecture, both ecclesiastic and domestic, is the pairing of two arched windows or arcade openings, separated by a pillar or colonette and often set within a larger arch. The Crusader armies were made up of many different nationalities bound only by faith in the same God. At a time when the remaining architectural structures of the Life became generally less secure after the Carolingian period.

Combined with the pierced carving of the capitals, this gives a delicacy and refinement to the interior.In England, such decoration could be discrete, as at Although much sculptural ornament was sometimes applied to the interiors of churches, the focus of such decoration was generally the west front, and in particular, the portals. This style was adapted to suit commercial buildings by opening the spaces between the arches into large windows, the brick walls becoming a shell to a building that was essentially of modern steel-frame construction, the architect The 19th-century reconstruction of the westwerk of the Romanesque Church and cathedral façades and external decorationTransitional style and the continued use of Romanesque formsChurch and cathedral façades and external decorationTransitional style and the continued use of Romanesque forms"In the years that followed the year 1000, we witnessed the rebuilding of churches all over the universe, but especially in Italy and Gaul." Sometimes the columns are in multiples of two or three. The Vézelay lintel is distinct, but some comparisons can be made between it and other Romanesque portal sculptures of the time. They are human as opposed to monstrous. A fusion of Roman, Carolingian and Ottonian, Byzantine, and local Germanic traditions, it was a product of the great expansion of monasticism in the 10th–11th century. Arcading is the single most significant decorative feature of Romanesque architecture. The crush of pilgrims was such that an extended Vézelay was aplomb. There is no consensus for the beginning date of the Romanesque style, with proposals ranging from the 6th to the 11th century, this later date being the most commonly held. They are a direct contrast to their "heathen" counterparts in the lintel. This is also common in Germany, where the apses were sometimes framed with circular towers and the crossing surmounted by an octagonal tower as at In England, for large abbeys and cathedral buildings, three towers were favoured, with the central tower being the tallest. Pg. The architects and artisans depicted the unbelievers as physically grotesque in order to provide a visual image of what they saw as the non-believers' moral turpitude. In Italy there is often a single central ocular or wheel window.Smaller churches often have a single tower that is usually placed to the western end in France or England, either centrally or to one side, while larger churches and cathedrals often have two. Although basically rectangular, piers can often be of highly complex form, with half-segments of large hollow-core columns on the inner surface supporting the arch, or a clustered group of smaller shafts leading into the mouldings of the arch. "The central portion of the Vézelay tympanum continues this process of politicizing religion. As the towers rise, the number and size of openings increases as can be seen on the right tower of the transept of In Italy there are a number of large free-standing towers that are circular, the most famous of these being the Polygonal towers were often used on crossings and occur in France, Germany, Italy and Spain such as that of the The most massive Romanesque crossing tower is that at Romanesque churches generally have a single portal centrally placed on the west front, the focus of decoration for the facade of the building. At Often the arrangement was made more complex by the complexity of the piers themselves, so that it was not piers and columns that alternated, but rather, piers of entirely different form from each other, such as those of The Corinthian capital is essentially round at the bottom where it sits on a circular column and square at the top, where it supports the wall or arch.