I.14.5
PURPOSEFUL MODIFICATIONS
One of the remarkable qualities of the planner of the
scheme of St. Gall is that, although he exhibits an extraordinary
sense of sophistication in the working out of
modular relationships, he does not hesitate to modify his
schematism when special conditions so require. I have
already alluded to this fact in my discussion of the 40-foot
module. There are two deviations from the use of this
module, which call for an explanation.
One of these is that accurate measurement of the aisles
of the Church shows them to be not 20 feet wide as their
explanatory title requests (latitudo utriusque porticus pedum
xx) but 22½ feet; the other is that the Dormitory and the
Refectory extend in places as much as 5 feet southward
over the 40-foot grid of the Claustrum (figs. 61 and 62).
What caused these modular incongruities? Are they due
to the carelessness of the copyist? Or are they purposeful
modifications? The latter possibility was suggested by
Arens, the former by Poeschel. Arens thought that the
surplus in the width of each aisle owed its existence to the
draftsman's desire to provide enough space for the thickness
of the walls of the church.[376]
Poeschel contends that
since the draftsman makes no concessions to the thickness
of the walls at any other place, it would be illogical to
expect him to do so here.[377]
Although Poeschel's argument is not to be dismissed
lightly, I am inclined to agree with Arens. We cannot infer
from the fact that the drafter of the Plan rendered the walls
of his buildings as simple lines that he was unaware of the
difficulties that might arise from this method of rendering
the more congested areas of the Plan unless they were forestalled
by special provisions from the very start. In the case
[ILLUSTRATION]
68. PLAN OF ST. GALL
A comparison of this with the preceding figure shows
how the draftsman, in developing his final version of
the plan of the Church, modified the square schematism
of the original concept—in which the aisles (PEDUM
XX) were assigned a width of exactly one half of the
width of the nave—by moving the aisle walls one 2½foot
module further outward. An instrument-drawn
grid of auxiliary lines, similar to the one above, enabled
the architect to plot the bases of nave columns, as well
as the location of altars and all other Church furnishings
with a precision so great that their exact
dimensional values were not lost in the freehand tracing
to which the Plan of St. Gall owes its existence.
The lines of the Plan as drawn on the parchment vary
considerably in width from less than 1/32 to over 1/16
of an inch, representing, at the scale of the document,
less than 6 inches to more than a foot. These widths do
not relate in any way to actual wall thicknesses. The
draftsman had a clear notion of line in the abstract
Euclidean sense of defining the limits of an area. The
lines comprise a diagram drawn to scale with astonishing
accuracy. As an instrument of communication it transmits,
at this scale and at this stage in the evolution of
the Plan, all that can be expected of any plan at this stage.
It is a graphic image delivering a message concerned
with policy and concept. Wall thicknesses of structures
as they might take shape in the future were irrelevant in
mind of the drafter and to the purpose. Quite possibly
he did have some vague notion that certain structures or
parts of them might be of masonry, wood, or metal,
according to the traditions of the time. Uppermost in his
thoughts was the message.
In viewing the purpose of the Plan in this light, as a
paradigmatic delineation of Benedictine planning policy
for a "model" monastic establishment, the Plan stands
on its own, without embroidery of detail that would come
with development by others for a particular site.
The Plan is capable of interpretation in more than one
way, and that was part of its intent. If the Plan is
interpreted today, in this way, or that way, we are doing
no different than what was intended. It is this capacity
of the Plan to stir the imagination almost 13 centuries
after it was drawn in the Scriptorium at Reichenau that
is among its remarkable characteristics, a property
common to all great works of art.
E.B.
STEP 2: CONCEPTUAL GROWTH OF THE LAYOUT OF THE
MONASTERY CHURCH
of the freestanding buildings, the linear style of the draftsman
posed no problems as the space required for the wall
thicknesses in subsequent construction could easily be
borrowed from the open yard surrounding the building,
and did not have to be subtracted from the building itself.
But where a group of major masonry buildings butted
against each other, as in the case of the Church and the
adjacent claustral structures (fig. 61), the problem was
serious. Here the builder would have been forced to
borrow the space that he needed for the masonry either
from the interior of the Church or from the contiguous
gallery of the cloister, where spatial congestion was undesirable,
since this gallery, besides serving as a passageway,
was used for the daily assembly of the monks in
chapter. To obviate these contingencies the designer introduced
two safety measures: first, by increasing the width
of the aisles of the Church from 20 to 22½ feet; second, by
enlarging the contiguous cloister walk from 12½ feet (the
width of the other three wings of the Cloister) to 15 feet.
Without changing his style of rendering he thus interposed
a safety area 5 feet wide along the crucial line of encounter
of Church and Claustrum. He left it to the builder to
determine precisely what the thickness of the walls should
be but freed him from the need of invading any of the
adjacent spaces with his masonry as the building went up.
It is obvious that the insertion of this safety margin
between the Church and Claustrum would affect the layout
of the latter as well as its relation to the square grid. Thus
the cloister yard, instead of measuring 100 × 100 feet,
covers a surface area of 100 × 102½ feet; the Dormitory,
instead of measuring 40 × 80 feet, as one would expect in
the light of the 40-foot module, measures 40 × 85 feet;
in consequence all the buildings lying at the southern edge
of the claustral grid extend 5 feet beyond the southern
boundary of that grid.
On the north side of the Church it was equally undesirable
that any usable space be sacrificed to wall construction.
Here, too, the required space would have had to be subtracted
from either the Church or the contiguous Lodgings
for the Visiting Monks, the Master of the Outer School, and
the Porter.
