Hiscock, Nigel, 1940-

The symbol at your door : number and geometry in religious architecture of the Greek and Latin Middle Ages / Nigel Hiscock.

Aldershot, Hampshire, England ; Burlington, VT : Ashgate, ©2007.

xx, 421 pages : illustrations, maps ; 26 cm

"The present book explains how the architectural symbolism proposed could have been understood at the time, as supported by medieval texts and its context, since it is context that can confer specific meaning. The introduction locates the study in its critical context and summarizes Christian Platonism as it determined the meaning of number and geometry. The investigation opens with the recurrent symbolism of the dome and the cube as heaven and earth in the Byzantine world and moves to the duality of the temple and the body in the East and West as reflections of Plato's universal macrocosm and human microcosm. The study then examines each of the figures of Platonic geometry in the architecture of the West against the background of their mathematics and metaphysics, before proceeding to their synthesis with the circle, as seen in circular and polygonal structures, the divisions of circles in Christian art, and their display in window tracery, culminating in the rose window. In view of the multivalency of the symbolism, the investigation establishes systematic occurrences of it, winch strongly suggest patterns of thought underlying systems of design. The book concludes with a series of test cases, which show the after-life of the same symbolism as it overlapped with the Renaissance."--Jacket.

9780754663003
0754663000

Symbolism in architecture.
Geometry in architecture.
Religious architecture.
Architecture, Medieval.
Architecture, Byzantine.
Symbolisme en architecture.
Géométrie en architecture.
Architecture religieuse.
Architecture médiévale.
Architecture byzantine.
religious buildings.
Church architecture.
Kyrkoarkitektur historia medeltiden.
Church Architecture
Symbolism. Architecture
Stained Glass.
Glass Painters.

Localisation: Bibliothèque main 259174
Cote: BIB 190038
Statut: Disponible