Medieval Art
Rose Windows
Many circular windows, (found in Medieval churches), are called
rose windows. Rose windows are large, stone-traced circular windows. They
are found in Romanesque churches in both England and the Continent where the
use of the wheel window was made. Wheel windows are "circular windows
ornamented by shafts radiated from a small center circle" (according
to the definition of www.encyclopedia.com), and Rose windows were developed
from the wheel window’s prototype. Rose window development flourished,
especially in France, where they appear in many important Gothic cathedrals.
Stained glass was usually placed in the windows, and the early examples (12th-13th
Centuries), as on the west façade of the cathedral at Chartres, were
filled with plate tracery. The typical rose was filled with radiating and
intermediate bar traceries. In the final course of bars, they were arranged
in wavy curves and intricate patterns, and suggests the design of an open
rose.
The Symbolism of Rose Windows
British author, Painton Cowen, refers to rose windows as “the key to one’s soul”. C.G. Jung added that focused concentration on a rose window and its symbols can be a catalyst toward complete inner harmony with the soul. Rose windows use geometry in three different ways: manifest, hidden, and symbolic. The circle has been universally accepted as a symbol of endless time, perfection, wholeness, and everlasting existence. The circle also contains all patterns within itself. A rose window’s hidden geometry relates the story of each windows elements to the center. The symbolic geometry, both Cowen and Jung agree, embodies unconscious meaning. According to them, squares and circles seem to have universal significance in symbolizing the finite and the infinite, earth and heaven, matter and the spirit.
Make a Rose Window:
You can create a simulated stained glass/rose window, using paper with symmetrical
cutouts using scissors, construction paper, and tissue paper. Here are the
steps:
!. First look at examples of Rose windows and think about the symmetry of
nature.
2. Cut a circle from a 18”x18” square of heavy black (construction)
paper.
3. Fold and cut the design like a large snowflake, however do not cut from
the outer edge from the circle, or it will be a black snowflake as opposed
to a rose window.
4. Fill shapes symmetrically with many colors of tissue paper.
5. Laminate the construction rose window, and hang it in the window.
An additional way to create translucent Rose Windows is to draw and color the window on wax paper using crayons. When the window is done, heat the paper slightly in an over or under a heat lamp to melt the crayon into the paper. Put it in a cardboard frame and your done!
Go see the Bayeux Tapestry
Go to Illuminations
Back to the chapel
Back to Home