CAROLINGIAN, ART. - It comprises the art of Western Europe under the rule of the Carolingians (751-911), especially the art of the court of Charlemagne (768-814) and of his successors. It was spiritually born in the cultural centers of the imperial court, at Aachen, Ingelheim and Nijmegen, but it developed in the great monasteries in direct relations with the royal family, as at St-Denis, Reims, Metz, Tours, St-Riquier, Lyon, Echternach, Mainz, Fulda, Lorsch and Reichenau, and soon extended to Switzerland (St. Gall) and into northern Italy (Milan). Rome and central Italy were little affected by the influences of this art. This artistic flowering assumes in many respects a Renaissance character, given by the evident influence of classical and Early Christian monuments. The new orientation was already announced under Pepin, when Anglo-Saxon missionaries in Germany, such as St. Boniface, came increasingly into contact with Rome.
But perhaps more than these spiritual ties, Charlemagne's political idea, and above all that of the "renovatio Romani Imperii", with his coronation in Rome (a. 800) also announced changes in the field of art. Charlemagne's ideal was Constantine the Great. Together with the emperor, his intimate counselors, such as Alcuin, Rabanus Maurus, Einhard or Angilbert, seconded the new ideas, as in politics, so in humanistic studies and in art.
The classical form dominates, but a survival of Merovingian art is still clearly felt, with influences of various cultures, especially the Irish, the Byzantine and sometimes the Muslim.
The emperor did not limit his interest to the new architecture, to painting or to the minor arts; he also dominated the spirit of this artistic movement.
With the development of political and religious life, a great architectural activity also began, especially in the recently subjugated countries. New churches then arose at Lorsch (ca. 767), at Paderborn (a. 777), at Bremen (a. 789), at Aachen (ca. 790-805), at Centula (ca. 790-836), at Germigny-des-Près (ca. 800) and in many other places. There is also much information about the imperial palaces, which the excavations at Nijmegen and Ingelheim have proved accurate. In general they developed from the ancient royal aula, adding other constructions on the model of prototypes existing in Italy and in Africa.
In this one senses the contact with the Muslim world. The sources tell us of the grandiose complexes of the new monasteries; of that of St. Gall (820) an old plan has survived, and of the arrangement of the churches and buildings of Lorsch a clear idea can be had from the latest excavations. But of secular architecture very little is known (e.g., the "house of Rabanus Maurus" at Winkel).
The new churches were built in various forms. Thus, while the old basilical type without transept proper to the Merovingian era continued, in some cases the basilica with transept was preferred, taking its example from the Roman churches of the 4th century, as at St-Denis (ca. 754-75), at Fulda (ca. 790-819), at Seligenstadt (ca. 831-40) or at Hersfeld (ca. 831-50). Sometimes these churches have isolated bell towers, like St. Salvator of Monte Cassino.
The separation of the clergy, always increasing in the great abbeys, from the laity, led to new requirements in architecture; the construction developed toward the entrance in a block of building toward the west (Westwerk), which perhaps also served as a baptistery. Thus in the basilica today destroyed at Lorsch (ca. 774); but the most grandiose example was at St-Riquier at Centula (ca. 790-799), rebuilt by Angilbert, son-in-law of Charlemagne. The churches of polygonal plan, on the other hand, derive from Byzantine prototypes; and the most beautiful example is given by the octagonal chapel of Aachen (ca. 790-805), which recalls St. Vitale of Ravenna.
The plastic decoration of the palaces and churches also largely imitates the classical forms, when ancient marbles, capitals and columns transported from Rome and from Ravenna to Aachen, to Centula, to Werden, to Fulda, to Lorsch, to Hersfeld, to Ingelheim or to Nijmegen were not actually employed in the new constructions.
It is known from a letter of Einhard that capitals were copied from ivory models. The chancel screens and the bronze doors in the cathedral of Aachen also imitate the classical forms.
Of the very rich decoration with mosaics, frescoes and sculptures of the Carolingian palaces and churches almost nothing has survived. Sometimes, however, works of ancient art were held in great honor, and there is knowledge of a large statue of a king on horseback, which Charlemagne transferred from Ravenna to Aachen; and certainly the statuette of an emperor, coming from Metz, today in the Louvre in Paris, is a copy of that prototype, just as the she-wolf (or bear) in the cathedral of Aachen recalls the "she-wolf" of Rome.
Of monumental painting too there are many records, but very little has survived. Of the mosaics only one example has come down to us, at Germigny-des-Près (806), which recalls Eastern prototypes.
Of the mosaics of Aachen a memory has survived in some drawings. A few fragments of fresco found at Lorsch (today in Darmstadt, in the museum) allow one to glimpse the beauty of the wall paintings of the Carolingian age, whose development is then documented by the frescoes of Mals (before the year 881) and of Münster (today in Zurich, National Museum).
Illuminated codices make it possible to study the orientations of the different schools. Close to the imperial court, perhaps in Aachen itself, flourished the Schola palatina, of which a group of codices with classicizing miniatures has survived. One of its most beautiful products is the Emperor's Evangeliary, today in the treasury of Vienna. Another group of illuminated codices derives from a school that finds its prototypes in classical painting, but also displays Eastern influences. Its most significant product is the codex that Ada, perhaps the emperor's sister, gave to St. Maximin at Trier (Trier, library). From the "Schola palatina" derives the school of Metz, flourishing especially under Louis the Pious (d. 870), and that of Reims. Another monastery very closely linked to the court and supported especially by Charles the Bald is St-Denis. Very close to its products is the splendid Bible of St. Paul (Rome), probably written for Charles the Fat (ca. 880-88) by Ingolbert, which shows a combination of influences from the different schools of Metz, Reims, and Tours. The school of Fulda, with St. Boniface, comes into contact with England, but is strongly influenced, with Rabanus Maurus, by Tours.
In the eastern zone of the kingdom the school of St. Gall develops. In Italy the miniatures of the schools of Bobbio and of Ivrea, and sometimes also those of Montecassino, show in their more advanced phase influences from Frankish abbeys as well.
The development of the minor arts, especially in the field of ivories, follows a similar line. The earliest works of Charlemagne's time in fact show evident classical elements, and likewise the ivories of the school of Ada. The school of Metz too initially shows many elements of classical taste; thus the binding of Drogo's Sacramentary (826-55) in Paris.
In the field of goldsmithing too enormous losses must be lamented. Nevertheless some pieces have survived, and they show a stylistic evolution analogous to that of the miniatures and of the ivory sculptures.
The altar of Volvinius at St. Ambrose in Milan, dedicated around 835 by Bishop Angilbert (824-66), is very close to the school of St-Denis, but was certainly worked in Milan.
For glyptics too the sources record many works executed with precious or engraved stones, but few have come down to us. In this field too, as in that of the imperial seals, the classical or early Christian style and technique were taken up again.
Almost nothing has survived of the many fabrics that adorned the walls of palaces and churches or served for worship. What has survived shows that the silk textiles were for the most part imported from the East, but sometimes also came from Italy.
As in that of politics, so in the field of art during the Carolingian period, after the division of the empire, a separation between the eastern and the western territories becomes ever more evident. In fact, while in Charlemagne's time the artistic manifestations of the territory of his empire were characterized by a revival of classical forms, subsequently, with the intensifying of the influences of the various currents of Eastern art, the orientations of taste proper to the Franks and the Germans manifest themselves with greater definiteness. - See Pl. LII.
Bibliography12 works
Fritz Volbach