Medieval Fortified Churches
The Transylvanian villages with fortified
churches provide a vivid picture of the cultural landscape
of southern Transylvania. The seven villages inscribed are
characterized by the specific land-use system, settlement pattern,
and organization of the family farmstead units preserved since
the late Middle Ages, dominated by their fortified churches,
which illustrate building periods from the 13th to 16th centuries.
We mention here the churces from Calnic, Prejmer, Viscri, Darju,
Saschiz, Biertan and Valea Viilor. Since 1993 Biertan fortress
church, as well as the access paths around it is on the World
Heritage list drawn up by UNESCO, and from 1999 the other 6
churches was added to the list.
The nominates sites are settlements of the Saxon colonists of
Transylvania. They are relevant for ethnology, the history of
architecture (above all the defensive architecture), and the
history of urbanism. At the same time their political, social
and religious history is very interesting.
The fortified churches, representing all the important types of this phenomenon
of European architecture, constitute not only the ending point or a variation
of it, but also architectural masterpieces, due to the way they have intermingled
and adapted, over more than two centuries in use, the most complex and elaborate
forms of the time. These accomplishments are not isolated; on the contrary, they
are representative for a general phenomenon on a well defined geographical and
historical area - the Saxon colonisations on the ancient "royal lands" of
Transylvania.
Over these two last centuries, the villages have preserved almost unaltered the
original topographical structure of the site (street network, plot system); on
this basis developed types of constructions specific of these sites, and that
reflect the political, social, and religious history of their creators, the Saxons
of Transylvania. Often they are integrated in a landscape structured by the traditional
human activities in the places where they are found.
The design of these sites - regular street network, with compact fronts alternating
the façades and the high surrounding walls, located close to the church
placed in the middle - contributes to the definition of the cultural pattern
of this zone of multiethnic and multicultural Europe - Central Europe.
The fortified churches are outstanding as a group. Nowhere in the world can one
find within such a narrow space so many fortified churches. That proves that
this cultural phenomenon had spread all over this geographical and ethnic area.
They constitute an exceptional work of architecture, due to the wide range of
defensive architecture patterns from the late European Middle Ages. While in
Western and Southern Europe certain defensive patterns applied to churches are
characteristic of certain territories or country (for instance, the fortified
churches in France and in the northern countries, the churches with fortified
precinct in Germany, and in Austria), one finds in Transylvania the presence,
in the narrow space already mentioned, three main types of church fortification:
- the fortified precinct church (for instance, Prejmer),
- the fortified church (for instance, Saschiz)
- or the fortress - church (Valea Viilor as example of complexity).
It is worth
mentioning that these fortifications are adapted reconstructions of earlier monuments.
In most cases the fortification of the entire range of structures has resulted
in transformations. Short Romanesque basilicas without a tower or with a west
tower, and late Gothic churches with a single nave have undergone alterations.
Sometimes these fortifications have created monuments with a double function
- sacred and defensive, perfectly balanced from the point of view of form and
function (for instance, Saschiz, Cloasterf, etc.).
These achievements of the defensive architecture are added to the intrinsic
worth of the churches revealing the spread of certain architectural styles,
from Roman
art to the late Gothic. The churches have preserved precious inner elements:
altars at Prejmer (about 1450), mural painting fragments (Dârjiu), furniture
from the 16th century (Prejmer, Saschiz, Valea Viilor). The fortified mansion
of a nobleman is itself authentic and valuable by its architecture.
The regular street network, though sometimes influenced by the relief, is characteristic
in the nominated sites; most of them are developed along a street or a vast
median space, sometimes doubled by secondary axes (for instance, Câlnic,
Valea Viilor, Biertan, Viscri). Other less frequent types of village develop
according
to a place emerged as a result of the church fortification (Prejmer).
The protected zone - the historic core - has preserved the narrow long pieces
of land attested by documents and researches, as well as the way in which that
piece of land is organised: usually the house walls bearing pinions face the
street, while the annexes are lined in a row. At the same time, it is possible
to rebuild historically the plot system of the cultivated lands (for instance,
Viscri), as the toponyms designating the ancient properties have been preserved
in the oral tradition.
The tightness, typical of these sites, has also been preserved: continuous
rows of houses with half buried basements and high ground floors, with few
openings
and pinion, and surrounding walls at the height of the façade, sometimes
bearing the same decoration.
The location of public buildings has remained around the fortified church. Some
of them are still functioning: the presbytery or the parishioner's lodgings,
the school and the schoolmaster's house, either in the schoolyard, or close by,
the mayoralty and ceremony hall, the barn. The number of buildings and their
architectural worth is remarkable for all the nominated sites.
In the Saxon sites that are situated on the "royal lands", and above
all in the nominated sites, it is likely to find two types of dwellings conserved
almost intact. At the same time, the variety of adornment patterns, and certain
important changes of the pattern range mark their evolution in time.
The sites have preserved until the 1980s their nature of multiethnic settlements,
with ethnic districts which still exist.
The specific details justifying these criteria are mentioned in the 2nd chapter
(item d.) of the dossier of each site.
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