Santa Maria (Matadars)

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Santa Maria de Matadars Church

The church of Santa Maria von Matadars or Santa Maria von Marquet is - along with the church of Sant Julià de Boada  - one of the oldest and most important buildings of Mozarabic architecture in Catalonia .

location

The church of Santa Maria de Matadars is located in the municipality ( municipi ) of El Pont de Vilomara i Rocafort in the Pla de Bages countryside and wine region in the province of Barcelona in the autonomous region of Catalonia . It lies at a height of about 200 meters above sea level. d. M. The nearest larger city, Manresa , is about ten kilometers (driving distance) to the northwest.

history

There is no documentary evidence of the time the church was built or the year it was consecrated. It was first mentioned in 956 in a deed of donation in favor of the Santa Cecília de Montserrat monastery . In the following years it served mostly as a parish church, because in the 11th century it received a new nave and in the 17th century a baroque altar , which was removed again in the 1950s as part of an extensive restoration measure.

architecture

Exterior construction

The exterior building, made of largely unworked rubble stones , is divided into an apse , crossing tower , sacristy and nave; the first three components mentioned are assigned to Mozarabic architecture , while the nave belongs to the Romanesque style epoch . On some wall sections of the Mozarabic building, herringbone patterns can be seen, which were originally intended to protect against disasters ( apotropaic ), but later were meant to be decorative. The narrow east window of the flat-closing and almost square apse is crowned by a small horseshoe arch . The masonry of the nave consists of semi-regularly hewn stones that are arranged in layers. The facade of the church is almost unadorned.

Interior

The approximately 3.20 meters wide and 7.50 meters long barrel-vaulted nave is unplastered. There is a cross-shaped window above the entrance portal; further small - previously unglazed - arched windows open in the side walls. To the east - behind a choir or triumphal arch constructed from quarry stones and designed as a horseshoe arch  - there is an approximately 3.20 meter wide and 1.20 meter deep “crossing area”, which leads into the plastered apse with a second horseshoe arch.

Furnishing

The church's furnishings included a polychrome Romanesque statue of the Virgin Mary ( Virgen de Matadars ) from the second half of the 12th century, which is now in the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya in Barcelona. With the crowned and grown-up child Jesus on her lap, she corresponds to the image type of the Sedes sapientiae ; the throne on which Mary sits has a resemblance to urban architecture - probably the Heavenly Jerusalem is meant.

literature

  • Jacques Fontaine: El mozárabe (In the series La España románica ). Encuentro ediciones, Madrid 1978.
  • Manuel Gómez Moreno: Iglesias mozárabes. Arte español de los siglos IX a X. Editorial Universidad de Granada, ISBN 84-338-2496-1 .

Web links

Commons : Santa Maria (Matadars)  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 41 ° 41 ′ 34.7 "  N , 1 ° 52 ′ 22.7"  E