The Newly Discovered Murals Inside the Church of Virgin
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Résumé: L’article analyse en première les peintures murales de l’église fortifiée Notre Dame de Ighișu Nou, signalées en 1934, mises en évidence en 2012 et restaurés en THE NEWLY DISCOVERED MURALS 2014. Les spécialistes ont prélevé INSIDE THE CHURCH OF VIRGIN MARY d’importants fragments dans le chœur, qui IN IGHIȘU NOU, SIBIU COUNTY relèvent le programme iconographique originaire, similaire avec le sanctuaire de l’église de Mălâncrav (c. 1400), composé par des Docteurs de l’Église Catholique, avec les symboles apocalyptiques des Évangélistes (St. Jérôme avec l’aigle de Jean et le bœuf de Luc, qui était représenté, après les canons, avec Augustine, qui a la figure difficilement visible à cause des dégradations), des Saintes-Vierges Dana Jenei (Catherine et Barbe ?), les prophètes Iona et Jeremias. Deux scènes de la Vie de Notre caractère spectaculaire de l’ensemble des Dame (la Rencontre à la Porte d’Or et la nobles Apafi, et dans la simplification de Naissance de Marie), sont préservées sur le certaines représentations, due à la tympan nord et le registre médian conserve contribution massive de l’atelier. des fragments de la Passion de Jésus Christ et le Vir dolorum. Autour de l’arc de Keywords: Transylvania, Ighișu Nou, triomphe les scènes du Jugement dernier Mălâncrav, mural painting, iconography, sont peintes en trois registres, tandis que style. sur le mur nord de la nave, les vies des saints Ladislas, Catherine et Margaret sont The existence of the murals inside the peintes. L’ensemble mis en valeur à Ighișu fortified church from Ighişu Nou (Eibesdorf, Nou est d’une majeure importance pour Szászivánfalva), a village that belongs today l’art médiéval, le répertoire de la peinture to the Mediaș municipality, is known since murale de Transylvanie de l’Europe 1934, evidenced in 2012 and restored in 2014 Centrale étant enrichi par des (Fig. 1). Ever since their discovery, the représentations inédites, caractérisées par connection to the paintings of the Mălâncrav des scènes uniques et typologies originales. sanctuary (c. 1400)1, known as a major D’une égale importance est le fait que cette landmark of the "international Gothic style" découverte confirme l’existence d’un in Transylvania and Eastern Central Europe atelier conduit par le Maître du sanctuaire was noticed. de Mălâncrav, un des plus importants The historical data are relevant in this peintres du “gothique international” de respect. The first mention of the settlement, cette partie de l’Europe, dont le style from 1305, is linked to the division of the unique a été identifié encore dans les nobleman Apa’s estate (the common ancestor peintures extraites du choeur de l’église de of Apafi and Bethlen families), among his Dârjiu. À Ighiș, sont réitérées des successors. Ighişu Nou was inherited by typologies, des éléments de décor, des Gregorius, Mălâncrav went to Gregorius vêtements, des armures, des scénographies filius Nicolai (his homonym nephew, de Mălâncrav, mais des différences mentioned mostly as Gegus in the later notables résident dans l’absence du bleu documents), and the third legatee was azurite, qui prive ces peintures du Jacobus2. REV. ROUM. HIST. ART, Série BEAUX-ARTS, TOME LIII, P. 47–62, BUCAREST, 2016 47 Fig. 1 – The Virgin Mary church in Ighișu Nou (Sibiu county). Inner view of the fragmentary ensemble of mural paintings discovered in the choir, on the triumphal arch and on the northern wall of the church. The next documents concerning Ighiș Romanesque window and, at least, the lower date from 1359 and mention Count part of the choir walls are preserved. The Valterus and the village elders – seniores church was fortified in the fifteenth century, de Isontelke, which means that at with a defensive floor on the altered apse, a Gregorius’ death, who had no heirs, the massive tower to the west, and a precinct village was bought by the community, reinforced with towers and bastions, which becoming a free settlement of Mediaș Seat3. was successively developed. Later sources from 1391, 1392 and 1394, According to the study published by the recorded Count Johannes, son of Johannes architect Paul Niedermaier in 1969, after de villa Jsopiswas4. eleven years of research, the choir and the In the years 1414 and 1415, the charters nave were erected in two distinct phases, refer to the church dedicated to Virgin Mary with the site stopped and resumed after a – ecclesia beatae virginis de villa Ysopis, led short break, by a different workshop, in by the provost Johannes, who was one of simpler forms. The differences between the Şeica Chapter priests, who turned against the two parts of the church, both built in bishop from Alba Iulia5. The latter document stonemasonry, are spatial, technical and was issued on February 18th 1415, by Pope formal6. John XXIII in Konstanz, where the The present polygonal apse is covered Ecumenical Council that ended the schism of by a Gothic vault on stone ribs, with the the Catholic Church took place. key decorated with a stylized carved wild rose, while the walls, supported by * buttresses outside, are pierced by high, The Gothic one nave church in Ighişu Nou narrow, pointed windows, with double was built in late fourteenth century, stone frames, tracery and the old colored seemingly, on the place of an older building round stained glasses partially preserved, to of which the sacristy with a small the north and northeast. 48 Fig. 2 – The carved stone sedilia on the southern Fig. 3 – The pinion of the old tabernacle, dismantled and part of the choir: Paul Niedermaier, Biserica cetate built in the upper part of the west tower. din Ighișu Nou, in Muzeul Brukenthal, Studii și Cercetări, 1969, Plate IX a. The triumphal pointed arch is also built disposed in the upper part, outside. Inside, in profiled carved stone, while the nave is the stone sedilia, with a triangular covered with a simple ceiling and provided tympanum decorated with a pretentious with three entrances to the west, south and tracery, is crowned by the pelican feeding north, the latter being walled up. its young, this consecrated symbol of Christ The main western door, with the portal replacing the regular fleuron (Fig. 2). The richly decorated with moldings in retreat gable of the old tabernacle, dismantled in and a frieze of capitals with vegetal the late fifteenth century was built in the motives, was later protected by a portcullis, upper part of the west tower masonry, whose guide grooves are still preserved in beneath the watch gallery (Fig. 3). These the adjacent buttresses. valuable items of decorative sculpture are One aspect that retained the scholars’ comparable with the pieces in the church attention is the typology of the windows in choir of Curciu, where they are preserved the apse, with the upper tracery delimitated in situ9. The new tabernacle from Ighiș, by a horizontal baguette, also identified in adorned with the figure of Vir dolorum in other several churches of the Târnava Mare relief bears the date 1491 and is the first Valley, from Șaroș7, Curciu and Mălâncrav8. known piece of a series of similar items, The stone decoration of the choir which are preserved today at Bazna, Valea includes human and animal figures that Viilor (1504), Cisnădioara (1504), Tărpiu adorn the architecture. On the windows (1504), Dupuș (1511) and Boian10. ledges are disposed a stylized lion head The defensive arrangements of the with a grotesque expression and a small church, begun around 1420 with the oval seated figure with three hands, keeping the irregular precinct and the old gate tower, globe and a scroll, an original produce of were continued after the first Turkish the medieval imaginary that probably incursion on the Târnava Mare Valley in symbolizes the Holy Trinity. Other carved 1435, with a defensive floor in masonry human heads are apparently randomly added to the choir. In 1494, the massive 49 western tower of the same width as the The fragmentary ensemble of murals nave and a bell from 1496 was built in researched in 2012 was fully brought to brick atop the older walls of the church, light, conserved and restored in 2014 by a being reinforced with buttresses of the team coordinated by Péter Pál and Kiss same material11. Loránd. Important mural fragments were The works were continued in the first found in the choir and nave, where only the decades of the next century, when the north north wall and the eastern one, around the octagonal stair case of the nave was erected, triumphal arch were decorated. The surface with the year 1526 and the Mediaș Seat coat of the paintings was fully hammered in of arms represented on its door with a order to receive the new plaster that wooden frame, as well. The round bastion covered it until recently. was added to the earlier surrounding In the apse, the painting is preserved fortification, with the upper part of the façade mainly on top, but other fragments existing in decorated in brick, in a similar form in which 12 various parts, although discontinuous, allow the towers of the City of Sibiu were rebuilt . the assumption that the walls were originally The ensemble was developed later, with a decorated in three horizontal rows of rectangular court to the north, zwinger to the figurative representations, to which the south and the rooms of the community draperies register was added in the lower part. attached to the wall inside, today preserved Besides the dominant layer of painting, only on the southern side, the rest of them two earlier representations were evidenced by having been demolished. the restorers: a small Crucifixion scratched in The northern door of the nave was closed the plaster on the south wall of the choir, near and on its masonry a religious inscriptions in Latin was written, similar to the line the sedilia, and the image of Vir dolorum, preserved at the same height on the entire with Jesus in the tomb, framed by flying adjacent wall13, a small fragment being also angels with torches, near the tabernacle, on found in the choir, near the sacristy entrance.