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II.3.3

EXTENDED EASTERN ALTAR SPACE
(FORE CHOIR)

When the fore choir was introduced between the transept
and the eastern apse of the church, the T-shaped plan of
the Early Christian basilica was transformed into a Latin-cross
plan (crux capitata). The origin and dissemination of
this feature forms one of the most fascinating chapters in
the history of medieval architecture.[221] Contrary to Georg
Dehio's belief two generations ago, the Latin-cross plan
is not a Carolingian invention. It came into use early in
the fifth century[222] as a fusion of the longitudinal basilica
and the cruciform central plan of buildings traditionally
associated with Christian martyria.[223] The cruciform plan
is well established in such buildings as the first church of
St. John in Ephesus, built in the fourth to fifth century
(fig. 142);[224] the Nativity Church in Bethlehem, built by
Justinian in the sixth century (fig. 143);[225] the cruciform
basilicas of Thasos in Macedonia (figs. 144 and 145)[226] and of
Salona in Dalmatia (fig. 146).[227]

In Merovingian France the form appears as early as 577,
when the Greek-cross plan church of Ste.-Croix-et-St.Vincent
at Paris (completed by King Childebert in 558)

[ILLUSTRATION]

CRUCIFORM NON-AISLED CHURCHES WITH
DISENGAGED CROSSING

148.A TOMARZA, CAPPADOCIA. PLAN, 5TH-6TH CENT.

148.B HALVADERE, CAPPADOCIA. PLAN, 5TH-6TH CENT.

148.C PFALZEL, NEAR TRIER. PLAN, ABBEY CHURCH OF ADALA
(BEFORE 715)

The impetus to development of the Carolingian modular Latin cross plan
by small cruciform churches such as Tomarza and Halvadere and their
western derivatives or counterparts, such as Pfalzel, should not be overvalued.
Yet, the undeniable ubiquity of these small buildings spread
throughout the whole Christian world the concept of an arch-framed
—and generally tower-surmounted—crossing created by the intersection
at 90° of two volumes of space, each identical in height and width. Like
that of the quincunx church, this building type had distinct modular
implications, another feature making it attractive to the northern mind.

148.X. Sivri Hissar stands somewhat aside from the other Cappadocian churches. An
aisle added to the northern flank of the nave perhaps served as a sepulchral chapel for
St. Gregory of Nyssa (331-ca. 396) who owned large estates in this part of the world.

was transformed into a Latin cross by the addition of
aisles.[228] The new form thus created was subsequently
copied in several other Neustrian churches, most notably,
perhaps, in the church of Corbie.[229]

Dehio was of the opinion that the Latin-cross plan owed
its rise to practical considerations, namely the need for
more choir space for the worshiping monks. Graf stressed
the commemorative, funerary significance of the centralized
cruciform development of the eastern end of the church.
In a recent review of this controversy George H. Forsyth
has pointed out that these two theories need not preclude
each other and that a vast body of new material, made
available since the time Dehio and Graf discussed these
problems, tends in fact to corroborate both opinions.[230]

In the historical evaluation of this important architectural
motif, a sharp distinction must be made between its origin
and occasional appearance in Early Christian times and its
prevalence everywhere during the Carolingian period.
Practical considerations must have played a decisive role
in its adoption at the time of Charlemagne. The cult of
relics, which had introduced into the church a multiplicity
of altars, made it impossible for the service of the high
altar to expand into the nave or the aisles of the church.
Few monasteries had fewer than 100 monks, and some had
as many as 300 or 400. Without the insertion of a fore choir

[ILLUSTRATION]

149.B

[ILLUSTRATION]

149.A GERASA (JERASH), Palestine

CHURCH OF PROPHETS, APOSTLES & MARTYRS

[after Kraeling, 1938, pl. XLI and XLII]

[ILLUSTRATION]

150. MOUSMIEH, SYRIA

PRAETORIUM (or TEMPLE?) ca. 180

[after DeVoguë, I, 1865, 46, fig. 11.]

between transept and apse, there would have been insufficient
space for the monks participating in the service. At
the same time it cannot be denied that because of its
association with the relics of the Patron Saint of the church,
the high altar had acquired an intrinsically funerary significance—another
historical incentive for the absorption in
the basilican scheme of the cruciform arrangement of the
centralized paleochristian martyria. Lastly, it is also quite
clear that the Carolingian architects who struggled with
the development of the Latin-cross plan could hardly have
been blind to the exciting aesthetic implications of a
fusion between the basilican and the central plan.

Churches with extended altar space preceding the Plan
of St. Gall, as I have already pointed out in my discussion
of Reinhardt's reconstruction of the Church of the Plan,[231] of
St. Gall are the Saviour's Church of Neustadt-on-the-Main,
shortly after 768/69 (fig. 133); the abbey church of St.
Riquier (Centula), between 790-99 (fig. 135); the Carolingian
Cathedral of Cologne, between 800 and 819 (fig.
139); and the abbey church of St. Mary at Reichenau-Mittelzell
(fig. 134), built by Abbot Haito between 806 and
816. Even the church of the model monastery of Inden,
built by Emperor Louis the Pious between 815 and 816 for
Benedict of Aniane and his chosen community of only
thirty monks, had a rectangular space inserted between
transept and apse (fig. 147).[232]

The innovative aesthetic significance of this motif lies
not so much in the addition of the space as such, but in the
modular alliance into which it enters with the crossing
square, the transept arms, and by extension, although at a
slower rate of development, with the square division of the
nave of the church.