Sant Salvador de Bianya (church)
Sant Salvador de Bianya is a structurally heavily modified Romanesque church from the 12th century in the Catalan province of Girona in Spain . Despite the numerous structural modifications that the building has undergone over the centuries, this church is one of the most interesting Romanesque buildings in the Garrotxa . The church is located in the small village of the same name, Sant Salvador de Bianya, which administratively belongs to the municipality of La Vall de Bianya . The originally independent parish of Sant Salvador de Bianya was incorporated with its parish in 1969 into the larger parish of La Vall de Bianya.
architecture
The church was originally built as a single-nave, Romanesque building. The slightly pointed arched vault, reminiscent of the Gothic, replaced the original Romanesque barrel vault that collapsed in the 1428 earthquake . The new pointed arch vault is based on originally Romanesque masonry. The entrance portal with its columns, capitals and pigtail-shaped archivolts as well as parts of the altar area were extensively restored in 1911 by the modernist architect Rafael Masó from Girona, maintaining the Romanesque style. Side chapels and a sacristy were added to the building in the 18th century. A small window was built in the middle above the Romanesque triumphal arch and under the ceiling of the new pointed arch vaulting above it. The semicircular apse, separated from the nave by the triumphal arch, has been preserved in its original Romanesque state. The central apse window has decorative columns, capitals and archivolts on both the inside and outside. A cornice on the outer wall runs through the apse and the entire nave. The original Romanesque bell wall was converted into a bell tower with a four-sided roof in 1615.
Furnishing
Consoles
Above the entrance portal in the south is a band of console stones with two figures. The following are shown in detail: a human couple, the man's head with a beard and mustache, the woman's head with a clearly emphasized hairstyle and a heavily eroded owl's head decorated with geometric figures. Further console figures and patterns can be found on the consoles of the outer wall of the nave and the apse. Sant Salvador de Bianya is one of the few churches in the Garrotxa that has ornate console bands.
Capitals
The church is adorned with various column capitals: at the entrance portal, inside and outside the apse window and above the two pilasters of the triumphal arch. Only the latter two capitals still originate from the Romanesque period. Both are decorated with two elaborate leaves, each with a human face between them. In addition to cords and stripes, motif figures from the game of chess are incorporated into the capitals.
Interior
There are four grave slabs in the central aisle of the church. One is dated February 11, 1872, when Juan Ayats, the owner of the neighboring agricultural property of the church, died. Two more grave slabs date from July 16, 1851 and 1699. Another grave slab covers a communal grave of deceased residents of the small village of the same name as the church.
The church contains a holy water font, 32 cm high and 40 cm in diameter, decorated with two lizard-like, mythological animals. The ornamented lizards bite each other's necks.
A pre-Romanesque immersion font (70 cm high and 95 cm in diameter) from the 8th century is decorated with surrounding ornaments. At the bottom a plaited stone cord runs around this font; A chain runs in the middle and a tooth-shaped band at the top.
History of the church
The church was first mentioned in 1090 as the property of the influential Sant Joan de les Abadesses monastery . The current church building was consecrated in 1170 by the bishop of Girona, Guillem de Monells, at the request of his brother Ponç, the bishop of Tortosa and abbot of the Benedictine monastery of Sant Joan de les Abadesses. In 1432, like many other churches in the area, the church building was badly damaged by an earthquake. The Bishop of Girona, Joan de Casanova, on a pastoral visit in the same year, ordered the church to be rebuilt within two years. On August 24, 1599, the painter Pere Mates i Espinosa from Girona was commissioned to create an altarpiece for the chapel of St. Andrew with scenes from the life of the apostle Andrew as well as figures of St. Mary, St. Peter, St. Sebastian and St. Salvador and to create the Evangelist John. These works were evidently made in the painter's studio in Girona and brought to Sant Salvador de Bianya, as there are known regulations about the settlement of damage when the pictures are transported to Sant Salvador de Bianya. In the 17th century the church had several side altars in addition to the main altar: the altar of St. Andrew, the altar of John the Baptist, the altar of John the Evangelist and the altar of Roser, Mary of the Rosary. At the end of the 17th century the altar to the Holy Christ was installed. The Saint Andrew altar was later dedicated to Saints Ponç and Saint Isidore of Madrid. Extensive restorations took place in 1911 under the direction of the architect Rafael Masó from Girona. The entrance portal with its archivolt, decorative columns and capitals was restored. At the same time the main altar received a retabulum with a scene from the Transfiguration of Christ. These restorations from 1911 were subsidized by the Lliga Regionalista, a conservative Catalan party to which the parish priest at the time also belonged and which thus thanked him for an election victory. The altarpiece for the Transfiguration of Christ, brought into the church by the architect Masó in 1911, was destroyed by fire in 1936 in the iconoclastic turmoil at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. The side chapels, which are currently inaccessible to the public, have been blackened with soot since this fire and have not yet been restored.
literature
- Josep Murlà i Giralt; Nicolau Gironès i Casanovas: Guia del romanic de La Garrotxa . Alzamora, Olot 1983, OCLC 434851504 . Page 158, there the article "Sant Salvador de Bianya"
- Enciclopèdia Catalana, Gran Geografia Comarcal de Catalunya, Volume 3, 1st edition, Barcelona 1981, ISBN 84-85194-17-9 (Volume 3), chapter "La Vall de Bianya", p. 366 f., There from p. 371 a brief discussion of the hamlet “Sant Salvador de Bianya” and the church of the same name
Web links
- Church of Sant Salvador de Bianya (description) on gencat.cat (in Catalan)
- Church of Sant Salvador de Bianya (photos) on gencat.cat (in Catalan)
- Church of Sant Salvador de Bianya on cataloniasacra.cat (in Catalan)
Individual evidence
- ↑ according to a clearly visible engraving of the year "1615" on a stone in the southern outer wall of the tower
- ↑ catalonisacra.cat
- ↑ The information about the subsidization of the restoration comes from the Gran Geografia Comarcal de Catalunya, page 371
Coordinates: 42 ° 14 ′ 49.6 ″ N , 2 ° 24 ′ 3.9 ″ E