Pre-Romanesque architecture in Asturias is framed between the years 711 and 910, the period of the creation and expansion of the kingdom of Asturias.
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👉 Asturian architecture in the context of Santa María del Naranco
The church of Saint Mary at Mount Naranco (Spanish: Iglesia de Santa María del Naranco; Asturian: Ilesia de Santa María'l Narancu) is a pre-Romanesque Asturian building on the slope of Mount Naranco situated 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) from Oviedo, northern Spain.Ramiro I of Asturias ordered it to be built as a royal palace, part of a larger complex that also incorporated the nearby church of San Miguel de Lillo, 100 meters away. The palace was completed in 842 and had in part a religious function, being consecrated in 848. Its structural features, such as the barrel vault—with transverse ribs corresponding one-to-one with contraforts at the exterior, make it a clear precursor of the Romanesque construction. The exterior decorations, as well as the use of stilted arches, mark the intended verticality of the composition.
It was declared a Monumento Nacional on 24 January 1885. Along with all other national monuments of Spain, it was classified as a Bien de Interés Cultural in June 1985. It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in December 1985.
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Asturian architecture in the context of Pre-Romanesque art and architecture
The pre-Romanesque period in European art spans the years from the emergence of the Merovingian kingdom around 500 AD (or from the Carolingian Renaissance in the late-8th century) to the beginning of the Romanesque period in the 11th century. While the term is typically used in English to refer primarily to architecture and monumental sculpture, this article will briefly cover all the arts of the period.
The primary theme during this period is the introduction and absorption of classical Mediterranean and Early Christian forms with Germanic ones, which fostered innovative new results. This in turn led to the rise of Romanesque art in the 11th century. In the outline of Medieval art pre-Romanesque was preceded by what is commonly called the Migration Period art of the "barbarian" peoples: Hiberno-Saxon in the British Isles and predominantly Merovingian on the Continent.