Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Cathedrals

Episode Date: February 26, 2021

If you have ever traveled in Europe, odds are you have visited at least one major cathedral. These massive religious buildings were and still are, the architectural centerpieces in most cities. Yet, most visitors to a cathedral will usually walk around, gawking at lofty ceilings and old art without ever really knowing what they are looking at. ...and by the way, what exactly is a cathedral? Learn more about cathedrals on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you've ever traveled in Europe, odds are you visited at least one major cathedral. These massive religious buildings were, and still are, the architectural centerpieces of most cities. Yet most visitors to a cathedral will usually walk around, gawking at lofty ceilings in old art, without ever really knowing what they're looking at. And by the way, what exactly is a cathedral? Learn more about cathedrals on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? throughline is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed.

It effectively turned day into night and how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the Thurline podcast from NPR. This episode is sponsored by audible.com. My audiobook recommendation today is Notre Dame, The Soul of France, by Agnes Portier. The profound emotion felt around the world upon seeing images of Notre Dame and flames opens up the question, why was everyone so deeply moved? In answer, Agnes Portier turns to the defining moments in Notre Dame's history, beginning with the laying of the cornerstone in 1163,

the coronation of Napoleon, Victor Hugo's 19th century campaign to preserve the cathedral, the 1950s film The Hunchback of Notre Dame starring Gina Lola Brigida and Anthony Quinn, and the state funeral of Charles de Gaul, before returning to the present. You can get a free one-month trial to Audible and two free audiobooks by going to Audibletrial.com slash everything everywhere or by clicking on the link in the show notes. To start any conversation about cathedrals, we first have to define what a cathedral is. A cathedral has nothing to do with any architectural style, size, or level of ostentatiousness. A cathedral is nothing more than the home church for a bishop in a diocese.

In theory, a cathedral could be a mobile home if it were the church of a bishop. The name cathedral comes from the Latin word cathedral, which means chair. The chair in the church was a symbol of leadership and the authority of a bishop. So the cathedral was the building with the chair. Today, the chair is more of a figurative term than literal. Every church has chairs and a bishop can have a chair in the same way that someone could chair a meeting, even if they are standing up. Because of the definition of a cathedral being the principal building of a bishop, many churches that people assume are cathedrals are often not technically cathedral.

Most famously, St. Peter's Basilica in Rome is not a cathedral. The Pope is the Bishop of Rome, and the main church for the Bishop of Rome is actually St. John's Lateran, which actually does have a very prominently displayed chair. Likewise, the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona isn't a cathedral. It's a basilica. The Cathedral of Barcelona is the Cathedral of the Holy Cross and St. Uliah. So what is a Basilica. Technically, there are two types of basilicas, basilica's major and basilica's minor. There are only four major basilicas in the world, and they're all in Rome. St. Peter's, St. John's Lateran, St. Mary's Major, and St. Paul's outside the walls. Every other basilica is a basilica minor, and these are just churches that are notable for religious, historic, or architectural

reasons. A cathedral can also be a basilica. In most Western European languages, a cathedral is known as a Duomo or a dom. This comes from the Latin word for house, which is domus. With the construction of the huge dome on the cathedral in Florence, Italy, this became the origin of the English word for dome. The first cathedrals didn't appear until the reign of the Roman Emperor Constantine, who legalized Christianity. Prior to this time, Christianity was mostly an underground religion.

What few buildings were dedicated to worship were usually residential homes, called a domus ecclese, and the bishop might have had a domus. almost Episcopalus. From here on out, I'm going to skip the technical definition of a cathedral and really just focus on big elaborate churches, which is the colloquial use of the word anyhow. In the vast majority of cases, however, they're one and the same. The first big Christian church wasn't technically a cathedral. It was what is known today as old St. Peter's Basilica. It was the church that stood on the current spot where St. Peter's Basilica stands today in Rome. It was torn down to make way for the current St. Peter's during the Renaissance.

I gave the modern definition of a basilica just before, but the ancient definition was actually a particular style of building. An architectural basilica was based on an ancient Roman design. It was a long rectangle with three sections, with two rows of columns on the inside. The middle section was wider and higher than the two sections on either side. There are several old churches that still have this architectural style. The St. Paul's outside the wall in Rome, the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Basilica's of St. Apollinaray Nouveau and St. Vitale in Italy. If you ever get a chance, visit the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, which is one of the oldest Christian churches in the world. It is an excellent example of this ancient

basilica style architecture. Over the centuries, the explicit Roman basilica design evolved into something called Romanesque. This style building was built from around the 8th century to the 13th century. These buildings deviate from the classical Roman layout. They're usually much bigger and have towers. They also have very thick walls, small windows, semicircular arches and windows and doorways, and often barreled semicircular ceilings. Examples of this type of cathedral are in Akin, Germany,

Santiago de Compostela in Spain, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. It's really hard to explain architectural styles on a podcast, but once you've seen a few Romanesque buildings, they're pretty easy to identify. As Christianity spread and the church grew in power, the purpose of cathedrals changed. They weren't simply buildings for worship anymore.

These were places where kings and queens would be crowned and where feast days were celebrated. Moreover, these were places of pilgrimage. People from all over would gravitate to cathedrals to pray at the tomb of saints and venerate various relics that the cathedrals might have held. If you had major relics like the tomb of an apostle, as Santiago de Compostela claimed, you could bring in tens of thousands of people. Other relics include the bones of the three wise men in Cologne, the burial shroud of Jesus in Turin, and the Holy Grail in Valencia.

Cathedrals were built in major cities, and the cities grew around the cathedrals. Markets and merchants developed in the cities which brought in funds to build ever larger cathedrals. As the fortunes of cities would rise and fall, cathedrals would often take centuries to complete, as funding could potentially dry up for years or decades before construction could start again. As there were incentives for larger cathedrals, building techniques were developed to make them even larger and more attractive as pilgrimage destinations. The big change going into the 12th and 13th centuries was the development of Gothic architecture. Gothic cathedrals were a marked change over the Romanesque churches of the previous centuries. They were built higher, with larger windows, bringing in more light.

These windows were usually giant stained glass windows which turned the insides of the church into a cacophony of color. The big techniques which allowed these buildings to be constructed were the pointed arch, vaulted ceilings, and the flying buttress. The pointed arch wasn't just a decorative feature. It was functional. It allowed downward forces on the walls to be better distributed, allowing the walls to be thinner. These arches allowed for ribbed and vaulted ceilings, which increased the height of the buildings. The flying buttresses were ribs placed on the outside of the building to support the walls

and prevent them from collapsing outward. These gothic cathedrals were built in such cities. as Amiens, Chate, Clon, Canterbury, Trir, Bouges, and of course the quintessential Gothic cathedral, Notre Dame in Paris. Most of these Gothic cathedrals were built in the shape of a cross with the main nave and a transept to cross the tea. After the Gothic period, cathedral building didn't stop. Gothic architecture gave way to Renaissance architecture and later Baroque architecture.

These are primarily defined by huge central domes over the altar. The first such major dome was the cathedral in the temple. Florence, Italy. The cathedral was begun as a Gothic-style building and then finished with an early Renaissance dome. The greatest and largest Renaissance dome by far is the dome on St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. This discussion of cathedrals is a large enough topic to take up an entire lifetime of study, far more than can be covered in a daily podcast. The big question is, how should you go about visiting a cathedral? How do you avoid just walking around, gawking, without any awareness as to what is around you. To begin, almost every cathedral will have some sort of gift shop. Buy or grab a

brochure or book at the entrance. Better yet, if you can, see if you can hire a local guide who knows the building inside and out. What should you look for when you're there? First, pay attention to the architecture. I gave just a brief overview of the main architectural styles. There's a lot more in the subject you can learn with even doing basic online searches. Many cathedrals have a mixture of styles because they were built over a period of time, or they have different innovations which were used in the building. Every cathedral is different, and you should look to see what makes the one you're in unique. The building might have also been damaged or reconstructed due to fires, earthquakes, or wars. Second, try to learn about the history of the building. A cathedral is a

reflection of the city where it was built. How it was built and the people who built it are a different story for each cathedral. There might also be a saint which is associated with the cathedral or some relics that are claimed by the building. Events such as coronations may have also taken place there depending on where it is. Finally, look at the art. There will be various paintings, sculptures, altar pieces, and carvings all over the cathedral. These may have been created by notable artists or artists you've never even heard of. Cthedrals are incredible structures, and they are history books in stone. They tell the religious, historical, architectural, and even technical stories of the cities where they were located.

Executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is James Mackala. The associate producer is Thor Thompson. Remember to leave a five-star review to get your review read on the show. They can be left at Apple Podcasts, Podcasts, Podcast Republic, or wherever you listen to the show. Also, you can help support the show over at patreon.com. Patrons can get merchandise like t-shirts and hoodies, as well as having direct access to provide suggestions for future episodes.