Images of Divine Order and the Third Mode of Seeing

Abstract

Modern theories of sequential styles and coexisting modes of expression are reviewed in relation to Romanesque and Gothic works. In both periods, the stasis and symmetry of heavenly figures contrasts with a disharmony that is associated with temporal imperfection; the two modes are often used in the same work. A method of expressing divine order through abstract structures is traced back to early neo-Platonic and north European pagan images in a variety of genres, including perfect geometric forms, symmetrical schemata, palindromes, and monograms. These are seen to provide the syntax, or underlying structure, for images of heavenly beings, of those that are spiritually enlightened, and of man's position in an ordered universe. Schemata were adapted, by the addition of representational elements, to pictographs and figured diagrams, and they provided the hidden structure for fuller renderings of visionary subjects. The examples discussed span the ninth to the fourteenth century, though images of divine order may have had greatest currency in the Romanesque period. An attempt is made to correlate the theories of two twelfth-century writers with Romanesque works. Theophilus' concern with order and measure, and with variety, suggests he was aware of the important role played by geometric structure, and perhaps by different modes, in medieval composition. The third mode of seeing defined by Richard of St. Victor seems to apply to images of divine order.