Stained Glass: The History Of Stained Glass

The history of stained glass.

Stained glass was known in antiquity, in Byzantium, Rome, Ravenna and Gaul, but only in the Romanesque period that the technique of this art is fixed and that its use is widespread. The first stained glass came from Germany (Lorsch in Hesse and Magdeburg) and appear to date from the tenth century. At about the same time, there were windows in Champagne and Burgundy. From 1100, begins a prosperous period for the stained glass. The first workshops moved to Chartres. Then Abbot Suger endows the Saint-Denis basilica, the first Gothic building, with a stained glass ornament. A Rhenish monk Theophilus, writing a book on the art of stained glass that will be the bedside book of master glassmakers to the present. The window

Repérons the main scenes found in the windows - scenes of canonical and apocryphal gospels scenes of Jesus' childhood or relationships miracles, as scenes from the life of Mary (eg St. Anne learning to read his daughter), etc. The search can be done then is to identify the biblical extracts corresponding to these scenes. - Some scenes from the history of the Church: this is how in the Cathedral of Saint-Brieuc, the window of the Blessed Sacrament mixes scenes from the Old and New Testament and also discusses the Councils of Nicaea , Lateran and Trent. - Some scenes from the lives of saints, protectors of the parish: the life of St. Thégonnec in Plogonnec, that of St. Mathurin Moncontour. And very often the master glassmakers in Britain have used the legend of the Breton saints. - Scenes also relate events of local life: the patriotic stained glass windows (works honoring died for France during the Great War, as in the Cathedral of Saint Yves Tréguier which blesses a dying) or stained glass related a drama of the sea (in the Chapel of Perros-Hamon in Ploubazlanec, stained glass recalling the great fishing in Newfoundland with the wreck of the brig "City of Le Havre" party of Paimpol in 1841). Reading windows also uses many symbols that

Examples include: - The symbols of the evangelists often depicted on stained glass. They refer to two passages in the Bible: the vision of the prophet Ezekiel (. Ez 1, 5- 21) and the Apocalypse of John (Rev 4 6-7). Jerome gives \\ 's explanation of this choice: \\' s man was awarded to Matthew because that \\ 'he begins his gospel by human genealogy of Jesus (Mt 1.1 to 17), the lion Marc Sklerijenn No. 50 9 because, from the first lines of his story, he evokes the "voice crying in the desert" which can only be the roar of the lion (Mark 1.3), the bull, sacrificial animal par excellence , Luc because of the story of the sacrifice offered at the Temple of Jerusalem by Zacharias at the beginning of this Gospel (Lk 1.5) \\ 's eagle Jean because this evangelist reached the heights of the doctrine as \\ eagle reached the mountain peaks. - Colors: again, as in the icons, they have meaning. White is the victory, the divine world, resurrection, light; The red signifies violence, martyrdom, the Holy Spirit because of the flames of Pentecost ... - holiness or symbols of divinity: the circle halo, the mandorla almond nimbus (golden circle surrounding the head of the saint, sometimes nimbus square for important people such as kings or popes); manually create or blessing of Christ in Majesty; the flame or the dove to describe the Holy