ARCHITETTURA ECCLESIASTICA

Ecclesiastical Architecture – I. General Considerations

Buildings intended for ecclesiastical use first and foremost meet the needs of worship (v. CHIESA); then they serve the requirements related to the education of the clergy and, more generally, the particular environmental conditions demanded by those who dedicate themselves to religious life.

The buildings that, in accordance with the above purposes, satisfy this complex set of needs are:

a) buildings for the celebration of sacred liturgy (churches, chapels, oratories, baptisteries); their most directly dependent annexes (sacristies, bell towers); or those necessary for carrying out the work of religious education, which finds its most coherent rationale and most suitable setting around the church (buildings for religious instruction, educators, researchers, associations); or those assigned to particular offices (curias); or those intended for the residence of the officiating clergy (bishops’ palaces, canonries, parish houses).

b) centers for the formation of the clergy: ecclesiastical colleges, seminaries;

c) places of retreat: abbeys, monasteries, convents;

d) centers of governance of the Church: papal palace, episcopal palaces, palaces of the congregations, directive and organizational centers of the various branches of ecclesiastical activity.

Elements that almost constantly appear in buildings intended for collective habitation and in which ecclesiastical architecture has expressed itself in characteristic forms include: cloisters; chapter halls; libraries annexed to the various types of ecclesiastical buildings; refectories; dormitories.

Within the broader scope of architecture, ecclesiastical architectural forms are brought, in these buildings, to the highest expressions permitted by the various degrees of civilization, material prosperity, and spiritual vitality.

From the earliest Christian constructions, such as the remains of catacomb annexes and the adaptations for worship of parts of houses whose owners had been converted to the new faith, we can deduce only a generic character of functional and formal simplicity, in relation to the historical needs of the first centuries of Christianity. Indeed, very few traces remain of the Roman domestic environments used for gatherings of worship, upon which the first churches were later grafted, and which today emerge only after centuries of modifications; for example, in S. Pudenziana, in S. Clemente, and generally in the primitive “titles” (v.); and only historical accounts can attest with certainty the existence of buildings where the earliest Christian communities gathered (dominium-dominica praedia), such as the dominicum Clementis (S. Clemente).

The first assertion of monumental Christian architecture is represented by the grand complex of the Lateran, the first official seat of the Bishop of Rome, founded by Constantine. Here were located the basilica, the episcopium (the residence of the Popes), later the patriarchium annexed to the basilica, the baptistery, the oratory of the Cross, a vast portico built by Pope Hilarius, and other minor buildings. Similarly, among the oldest and most notable groupings of buildings designed for religious purposes are those that formed around ancient St. Peter (Corpus sancti Petri) and around St. Paul.

The forms of these buildings (v. BASILICA; BATTISTERO; ORATORIO) are connected to the evolution of late Roman forms, to which the spirit of the new religion added clear stylistic particularities.

II. Architecture in the Regions of the East

In the Asian and African territories of the East, the new religion naturally flourished in a Hellenistic environment; this left its mark on the architecture of the buildings that the rapid development of Christianity was proposing in thriving centers, not only through the work of an opulent bourgeoisie but also through the formation of a numerous priestly and monastic class.

After Constantine and Helena, in the first half of the 4th century, religious constructions in Palestine, Syria, and Anatolia were numerous and important, monumental in size, form, and significance. As with the type of church, so too with the buildings connected to it, there was extensive use of ashlar stone, which the regions abundantly provided. Yet classical and Hellenistic elements are still found in the arrangement of entablatures with architraves (i.e., arching in correspondence with an intercolumniation), in the types of porticoes, and in the grouping of buildings around porticoes with the church at their center. There is an insistence on pilaster strips forming simple and superimposed porticoes, now with thrusting corners, now in the form of pseudo-arches (i.e., drawing the arch but acting vertically). The use of sail vaults and domes on pendentives constitutes a transverse load-bearing system, which, compared to the Roman systems predominantly longitudinal in order, represents a more solid structural bond, particularly in relation to the problem of roofing.

This architecture, while drawing from Roman tradition the effects of plasticity in the decorative projections of pilasters, bands, entablatures, archivolts, and moldings, also hints at certain decorative solutions destined to develop in subsequent periods leading to the Romanesque, namely colonnettes, hanging arches, string courses, and vertical divisions of façades. The ornamental repertoire, fundamentally derived from Ionic and Corinthian models, becomes flat and dry: acanthus leaves are sharp, ornamental foliage is lanceolate, common motifs are geometrized, and geometric ornamentation generally predominates. Indoors, following Eastern taste, polychromy composed of precious materials (marbles, enamels, vitreous pastes, metals) is preferred. Sculpture in low relief, strongly outlined, reflects the Asiatic tradition: flat, chiseled like metal, it tends toward a stylization with the character of stone carving.

Similar decorative features are found in Christian architecture in the interior of Asia Minor (Cappadocia, Lycaonia, Galatia) and in the southern regions (Pisidia, Pamphylia, Lycia, Isauria, Cilicia), which, however, present notable variants in the plan of the church, especially in central forms, where the Byzantine organism that would emerge from the 6th century onward begins to take shape.

The spread of monasticism and the cenobitic ideal promoted the construction of large convents in Syria, in the interior of the Hauran, along the Jordan, in the Gebel Hass, and in the territory of the Orontes (convents of St. Simeon Stylites at Qal’at-Sim’an, of Saqqah in the Hauran, designed not only for monastic life but also to accommodate pilgrims).

Similar groupings populated the territories of Christian Africa. The remains at Tebessa (Algeria) and the better-known ones called the White Monastery and the Red Monastery in Egypt document the origins of this religious architecture; in the latter case, they are of particular interest for understanding Coptic architecture.

With features characterized by particular construction methods in which the use of powerful masonry in rubble conglomerate prevails (similarly to Roman methods), the Armenian production is grafted onto this group of Eastern Christianity. Up to the 13th century, it gives us a type of church of its own, as well as documenting the fervent religious life in a series of vast convents and patriarchal palaces: the conventual constructions of Ecmiazin (7th century), of Aghtamar (10th century), of

1) Basilica of St Sabina (early 5th century) – Rome.
(from P. Taurisano, S. Sabina)

2) SS. Sergius and Bacchus (early 6th century) – Constantinople.
(from Diehl, Manuel d'art byzantin)

3) Church of St Andrew, design by L. B. Alberti (later L. Fancelli), begun in 1472.
(from Lübbe-Semrau, Die Kunst der Renaissancen)

4) Church of the Annunciation, design by G. B. Fornovo 1566 – Parma
(from Brinchmann, Baukunst der XVII. und XVIII. Jahrh.)

1) Basilica of St Sabina (early 5th century) – Rome.
2) Church of St Andrew, design by L. B. Alberti (later L. Fancelli), begun in 1475.

Mashen (11th c.), Gélat (11th c.), of Koska Vank near Ari (12th–13th c.), of Safar (13th c.), of Horomos, of Sanahin (11th c.); the patriarchal palaces of Zaurthnoc, of Cikherdabassi, of Bagaran, of Larin, of Mzen, of Talis. This architecture derives its external aspect from ashlar masonry and the facing of the core walls with irregular rubble conglomerate: this technique accords with a strong plasticity of forms and architectural masses (in analogy with Roman procedures), planimetrically animated and altimetrically modelled with broad architectural plasticity, both in the interpenetration of the volumes of elevation and in the development of the scrolls reinforced by stone arches, a system that seems to anticipate the subsequent Romanesque-Gothic procedures.

In its external decorative elements, through the assimilation of forms of varied provenance—Greek-Roman on one side and Mesopotamian on the other, accomplished in the 7th century and later in the 12th–13th centuries with Arab influences as well (to which the appearance of the pointed arch is owed)—this architecture

assumed a distinctive character. Contributing to this are the polychromy resulting from the contrast of stones of different colours, the effects of slight architectural features that unfold from delicate stringcourses to form panels and recesses, and the insertion of sculpture that is architecturally arranged in chiaroscuro zones, in bands, and in focal points of raised figures on recessed planes.

Linked to this Eastern group is Byzantine ecclesiastical architecture (v. ARTE), which in this case also finds expression not only in the vast cycle of church buildings (from the 4th to the 6th century in ascent, from the 7th to the 8th in decline, from the 9th to the 10th–11th century in a revival) but also in the great monasteries. The monastery of Sinai, Mar-Saba near the Dead Sea, the Coptic convents of Egypt, above all the monastery of the Meteora in Thessaly (16th century) and the monasteries of Athos may be cited as the principal types of monastic architecture of the late Byzantine Empire. The group of Mount Athos (v. ATHOS, MONTE) exemplifies this Byzantine architectural taste, according to which, around a large courtyard, are grouped the dwellings of the monks and guests, the refectories, the ablution fountain and characteristic loggias forming projections with a function analogous to the Western cloister: e.g., the monasteries of Lavra, Iviron, Vatopedi, Chilindari (12th–13th centuries); of the Pantocrator (1363), of Esphigmenon (14th century), of St Paul (15th century), of Koutloumousi (1540).

III. ARCHITECTURE IN THE WESTERN REGIONS. In the West, the religious building heritage likewise largely takes shape around the theme of monasteries. (For the church building in particular V. CHIESA; for the annexes, V. BATTISTERO; CHIOSTRO; cf. also the entries devoted to individual artistic periods.) It is the Rule of St Benedict that sets the architectural programme for the numerous series of monastic buildings; a programme that expands in the abbeys, true citadels organized for the life of large communities (v. ABBATIA; MONASTERO).

The advent of the great religious Orders shapes architecture (v. FRANCESCANE, A; DOMENICANE).

More austere and closer to the Romanesque style, broadly understood, are the Franciscan buildings. The Dominicans, by contrast, driven by their mission to engage with urban centres for the propagation of the faith, insert their churches and monasteries into the fabric of cities. The Romanesque-Gothic constructive formula, pushed to its extreme in the construction of churches, and the monumental expressions that derive from it—through the power of thick walls, the solidity of buttresses opposing the thrust of ribbed vaults, the interweaving of these ribs into geometrically complex bundles, the bold height of piers and colonnades pushed to the limits of resistance by skilful calculations—persists in the complementary, subordinate or annexed buildings.

In Romanesque architecture, the effect is of solid walls in which small, gathered windows are cut; contrasts between large polylobate windows and resistant cores in Gothic. Walls are marked by architectural projections (pilaster strips, bands) to delineate the internal order or to define subordinate zones in harmonious geometric relationships. Skilful modulations are traced according to rigorous geometric calculation, formally resolved in relation to the viewpoint, the lighting and the architectural function. As in Byzantine times, there is a renewed love for revetment worked in stone or marble materials, achieved through the juxtaposition of various colours or in the tracing of different jointing patterns to form designs.

This sense of colour is even more vivid in Italian art, both because of the strength of the Romano-Byzantine tradition (Veneto) and because of Arab influences (Sicily–Campania); but it is also frequent in French architecture, where, despite the stone structure, the taste for the sparkling colour of mosaics and frescoes that enliven the shadows remains ever alive; the decoration is graffito, flat, metallic, rich in meaningful and symbolic motifs, and the sculpture’s position and its plastic treatment and stylization are interpreted architecturally.

The same expressive effects that we see in churches are found in the medieval ecclesiastical annexes. From the contrast of architectural masses, from systems of vaults set against one another whose equilibrium determines increasingly powerful dimensions in the vast spaces, in the supports and in the counter-thrust elements,

and is animated: thus in the annexes of the church of Santa Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi with the art of Giuliano da Sangallo.

In other regions, where the decorative tradition is stronger, religious buildings are adorned with carvings and colour, whether in terracotta or in marble inlays. This is the Lombard and Venetian flowering of the buildings of the Certosa of Pavia, the sacristy of Santa Maria in Bergamo and the great 15th-century additions to the ancient abbey of Prataglia (Casentino). Refined rhythms of Bramantesque art compose, with aerial amplitude and soaring lines, the great cloisters of Sant’Ambrogio in Milan, and Bramante himself will repeat the same rhythmic scheme in the Roman cloister of Santa Maria della Pace.

More solid and rugged in the cutting of the travertine, the 15th-century Roman construction renews, with the restoration of papal power in Rome, the ancient tradition.

To the religious character of the 16th century corresponds an architectural language based—broadly speaking—on the revival of Roman architectural forms. These permeate the theme of the church and become interpreters of other ecclesiastical themes, which now reflect a new expression of authority and hierarchies.

The style of Vignola—diffused through a variety of regional schools—for its fundamental austerity and somewhat cold restraint proves suited to the interpretation of the religious theme, both in the church and in the ecclesiastical buildings connected to it, in keeping with the spirit of the time, dominated by the thought and action of the Counter-Reformation (v. CON-TRORIFORMA, ARTE della).

This taste imported the Roman architectures of the late 16th and early 17th centuries, as seen in the Casa Professa of the Gesù and in the college of the Neophytes annexed to S. Maria dei Monti.

In Emilia (at Reggio) there are two large convents: one of S. Prospero, the other grand in scale, of the Benedictines, where the work of architects of the Pacchioni family displays robust and well-proportioned architectures in a vast courtyard, around which the building majestically unfolds. Similarly in Bologna, in the cloisters and convents of S. Michele in Bosco by Michele Fiorini; of S. Giovanni in Monte by Antonio Morandi; of S. Gregorio by Andrea da Valle; of the Servites by Francesco Giulio Andreoli; in the Gesuate by Bartolomeo Richini.

We find again the austerity of Michelangelo’s architectures in the enclosed feeling of some 16th-century convents (at Florence, the church and convent of Ognissanti, taken up by Alessi in a convent of S. Chiara and in the cloister of S. Pietro in Perugia) and once more in the Certosa of S. Maria degli Angeli grafted onto the ruins of the Baths of Diocletian: a Michelangelesque taste that dominates all Tuscan Baroque architecture and is reflected even in ecclesiastical buildings through the artifices of Mannerism.

We find these characteristics in Florence in the constructions of the Carmine, in the convent of S. Firenze of the Filippini, which developed between 1643 and 1715 through the work of Silvani, Ruggeri, and Zanobi del Rosso; in the convent of the Carmelites of S. Maria degli Angeli and of S. Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi by Antonio Ferri (1680–89); in the additions to the convent of S. Jacopo sopr’Arno. We find them again, albeit with altered elements, in the Neapolitan Certosa of S. Martino. The subtle Lombard Bramantesque elegances echo in the architectures of the Zaccagni and the Tramello, at Parma in the convent of S. Giovanni Evangelista, at Piacenza in S. Sisto and in S. Sepolcro, in complexes that associate monastery, hospital, and commendatory houses linked by cloisters. Lombard effects enlivened by the color of frescoes spread across the walls like tapestries appear in the constructions annexed to S. Stefano in Venice, and in those of S. Giustina in Padua through the work of Briosco and Leopardi.

In the ancient Peruzzi spirit, by contrast, some Sienese monastic architectures survive (the monasteries of the Derelitte by B. Neroni called il Riccio, and of S. Maria by Anton Maria Lari), where large tranquil expanses of brickwork and insistent horizontality in the recurrence of planes accentuate the character of quietude fitting to the theme.

The theoretical preoccupations dear to Renaissance masters envisage the ecclesiastical theme: Alberti and Serlio devote chapters in their treatises to religious architecture; Palladio prefaces his treatment of religious architecture (proem to Book IV) with the statement that God, “being the highest good and the highest perfection, it is most fitting that all things dedicated to Him should be brought to the greatest perfection possible for us.” This perfection he derived, even for works consecrated to God, from the ancient model, from the inspiration of ancient architecture, which, having known how to transmit its temples with such constructive wisdom, provided the example to follow both in the choice of form “most apt to demonstrate the Unity, the infinite Essence, the Uniformity, and the Justice of God” (Book IV, chap. 2) and in that “... decorum, in which consists a most beautiful part of Architecture” (ibid.).

How this erudite and antiquarian foundation is transmuted into the architectural spirit of the 16th century is evident in churches where the Roman organism persists but is renewed in original forms. The religious buildings of Palladio bear clear witness to this: the remains of the grand convent of the Carità designed in Venice, with its

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BIBL.:
E. Casri Ramelli, *Edifici per il culto*, 1916

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Architettura ecclesiastica – Pianta della chiesa di Audincourt, Doubs (sec. xx), architetto D. Bellot.

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58. – Enciclopedia Cattolica. – I.

In the German centers of Europe, this taste is found in the convent annexed to S. Croce in Gerusalemme in Rome, in the annexes of the Barnabite house at S. Carlo ai Catinari, in the Greek college of S. Anastasio, in the convent of S. Marcello, in the annexes of S. Andrea della Valle, of S. Andrea del Noviziato (at the Quirinal), and it is composed into an extensive building at the Trinità dei Pellegrini. The architectural concept thus widely practiced consists in the opposition of broad façades to the core of the church, which dominates with its array of orders and chiaroscuro effects. Such is the aspect of some Venetian monuments, such as the building of S. Maria Assunta dei Gesuiti constructed by Domenico Rossi (1715–39) and by Fattoretto (1730), the group of the Gesuiti (S. Maria del Rosario and its annexes, by Massari, 1726–43), and the austere group of the Tolentini, on which the pronaos of the Tirai stands out.

The practice of housing aspirants to the priesthood in purpose-built institutions had already been implemented in some ancient foundations, such as the college of Alcalá in Spain, the college of the Jagelloni in Cracow, in England at Cambridge, and in Bologna at the college of the Spaniards (founded by Cardinal Albornoz in 1364), a document still today of typical Bolognese architecture in its large courtyard with depressed arches; in Rome, that erected by Cardinal Capranica under Eugenius IV. Elsewhere, these ecclesiastical colleges expanded into adapted ancient buildings (at Assisi in a complex of 14th-century structures; at Pisa in the annexes of S. Caterina dei Domenicani).

From the action of the Council of Trent stem the most significant architectural achievements in ecclesiastical colleges. Already in Rome, through the work of St Ignatius, the German College was established and the Palazzo of the Roman College was inaugurated by Gregory XIII in 1582. Here the author, more properly of Fr G. Valeriani, constitutes the model of interpretation of the theme relating to institutes of culture, such as the Casa Professa of the Jesuits. The Sapienza – the Roman archigymnasium – dates back to the early days of the Roman Renaissance, to Eugenius IV and later to Leo X; it was particularly cared for thereafter by Paul III and then by Gregory XIII and Sixtus V through the work of Giacomo della Porta. Borromini added the oratory and the wing of the library of Alexander VII. The building, with its halls arranged around the courtyard and the backdrop of the oratory, remains representative of the author’s style suited to ecclesiastical institutions of culture.

The works of St Charles Borromeo inspired the major constructions designed for ecclesiastical purposes of education: the Swiss College in Milan, begun by Fabio Mangone in 1608 and continued by F. M. Richini from 1630 and by Quadrio; the Major Seminary, designed by Aurelio Trezzi (from 1602) and executed by Fabio Mangone; the Borromeo College by Pellegrini (1563–85) and by Richini (from 1628 to 1629). The distributive layout of these buildings develops around a large courtyard with a double order of loggias, of such width that for each order there correspond two floors: such is the system of colonnaded porticoes, entablatured in the Swiss College, with a Palladian classical return in the form of arches on paired columns in the college of Pavia, and likewise in the college of Brera founded by the Jesuits in 1591 and completed by Richini in 1651.

In these works we have the architectural translation of the new educational spirit that formed under the influence of the Counter-Reformation, so that they remain symbolic of the character of educational institutions.

Between 1637 and 1650 there arose in Rome, on the site of S. Maria in Vallicella, the grand and monumental Oratory of the Filippini, the work of Borromini. In 1627, through the work of Urban VIII, the Urban College of Propaganda Fide arose for the apostolate among the infidels. In the authorial style of these monumental complexes, classical schemes are innovated and surpassed, replaced now by broad and deep pilaster strips, by framings that take advantage of the breadth of dominant solid masses, by contrasts and oppositions of volumetric curves, and by the accentuation of certain centralized motifs against the insistent repetition of repeated elements. Analogous solutions of this approach are found also in other monuments of this period: in Venice in the Patriarchal Seminary annexed to the church of the Salute, in other forms in the Flangini College by Longhena, and in Turin in the palace of the archiepiscopal seminary by Juvarra. This great architect created original means of expression capable of giving rise to new interpretations especially for this type of building.

6. Cathedrals and Episcopal Palaces

With the affirmation of the pre-eminence of the secular clergy, the cathedral constitutes its predominance over other religious institutes: thus, within the dependencies of the cathedral there arises the episcopal palace, forming an architectural complex that echoes by analogy the groupings of abbeys.

Among the monumental episcopal constructions of the Middle Ages, those of Laon, Auxerre, Narbonne, Reims, Orvieto, Viterbo, and Anagni deserve mention; these are now enclosed like little castles or open like noble palaces.

In the Renaissance, the episcopal building (and in general buildings intended for representative functions), such as the papal residence that arose on the Quirinal in the time of Gregory XIII, the Lateran palace in the time of Sixtus V, and those with governmental functions, such as in Rome the Palazzo of the Holy Office and (in connection with the hospital institution of Santo Spirito) the so-called Palazzo del Commendatore, fall, as regards their organic scheme and architectural composition, within the type of the Renaissance palace. The expression of noble, princely lordliness is taken up and brought to the new theme in regional and personal interpretations proper to the various periods in which they arise.

Thus, with specific ecclesiastical destination, there arose the fourteenth-century episcopal palaces of the Rossellino group in Piacenza, those of Perugia and Padua, and in the sixteenth century the Sangallo-style palaces of Amelia and Castro, of Ascoli (with a portal by Cola dell’Amatrice), and the grand archiepiscopal palaces of Pisa, Pavia, and Milan.

Neo-Palladian, with rather Neoclassical imprint, are the episcopal palaces of Vicenza and Venice.

After an interruption due to the persecutions against the Church following the French Revolution, there was – especially in the second half of the nineteenth century – a revival of ecclesiastical construction, which is also connected with the reconstitution and organization of many religious orders and with the expansion of missionary activity. Notable, in addition to new convents, are institutes of religious instruction, colleges, and, with considerable expansion in the construction of new churches, buildings annexed or otherwise dependent on them and integral to the religious service assigned to them.

Rome offers in this regard a very significant production, especially in the colleges that either were renewed in their ancient seats or were newly established. In this modern architecture there is reflected the eclecticism that characterizes the end of the nineteenth century. Monumental value is assumed by the College of St Anselm on the Aventine (by Fr Ildebrando da Hemptinne and Vespignani), where the Benedictine tradition is renewed in forms of great nobility and with signs of evident modernity.

7. CONTEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE

Contemporary ecclesiastical architecture still constitutes one of the most notable branches of architecture, not so much for a decisive stylistic value – which in any case has not been fully achieved in any branch of architecture – as for the importance of the themes it proposes to modern building technology: namely, the use of construction methods proper to our time (large-span structures in reinforced concrete, steel, and glass, etc.) and the refinement of technical solutions for certain requirements and installations (visibility, lighting, acoustics).

Interest in ecclesiastical building grew with the evolution of present-day architectural trends, which, arising after a period of diminished creative vigour (nineteenth century) owing to the predominantly positivist direction of art in general and of architecture in particular, gradually tend to rediscover, with a new spirit, the essentially expressive foundation of the elements involved in construction.

Initially, there were experiments with iron and masonry structures (St-Eugène in Paris – cast-iron columns – 1851; St-Augustin, also in Paris – iron roofing – 1861-70), followed by the first trials of reinforced concrete at St-Jean in Montmartre (Paris, 1894, architect A. de Bodaut); finally, this same material was used for the first time in its typical expression by the brothers A. and G. Perret in the churches of Notre-Dame du Raincy and St Teresa in Montmagny, also in France (1923-27), while the architect O. Barting experimented with entirely steel and glass structures (Protestant church at the Printing Exhibition in Cologne, 1928). The best architects now working on the theme of the church, while widely and often entirely applying the new methods, tend rather toward a free use of modern structures and the typical effects derived from them, bending them to a decisive expressive intent, both in proportions and in the mixed use of different materials, according to the aims and environmental conditions. Overall, though without the affirmation of a new mature stylistic direction and alongside the spread of an outdated and uninteresting mannerism, the results achieved by individual architects are often notable and sometimes reach the value of complete works of art, worthy of the high tradition of architecture and the past.

The countries that offer the most significant examples of modern ecclesiastical architecture are those that have made the strongest contribution to recent architectural evolution, such as Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Among German architects, we may particularly mention Emil Fahrenkamp, Hans Herkommer, and especially Dominikus Böhm, who moved from expressionist attitudes (church of Bischofsheim near Mainz, 1926) to more sober and constructive values (St Joseph in Hindenburg); among the Austrians, R. Kramreiter (church of Pernitz, Austria) and above all Clemens Holzmeister, more cautious in continuing, through his prolific output, with new means the intimate and festive tradition of Austrian Baroque and Neo-Baroque; finally, among the Swiss, K. Moser, especially for the church of St Anthony in Basel, where the cement structure reaches a new maturity of expression.

Nor should the work of Scandinavian architects be overlooked, such as G. Asplund and E. Thomsen (with a high stylistic sense of classical inspiration), Jensen and Kaare Klint (with most noble Neo-Gothic attempts), albeit carried out for Protestant places of worship, for their derivation from traditional Catholic religious forms and for their influence on all current religious architecture.

Less interesting appears the production in other countries such as France, Spain, and Latin America.

In Italy, despite the abundant production of ecclesiastical buildings, no decisive stylistic direction has yet emerged, as architects are still torn between traditionalistic forms pursued in vain through new simplifications and the livelier contributions of contemporary architecture. Among the most notable works, besides others, are those of G. Muzio (church of Santa Maria della Rossa in Milan, 1932; sanctuary of St Anthony in Cremona, 1937; design for the church Regina Pacis in Milan and St Ambrose in Cremona), of M. Piacentini (church of Christ the King in Rome), and of A. Foschini (church of SS Peter and Paul at the Universal Exhibition in Rome). – See Plates CXXIX-CXXXII.