Art in Spain and Portugal from the Romans to the Early Middle Ages: Routes and Myths, by Rose Walker
Wendy Davies
This book by Rose Walker is about the standing buildings and objets d’art of Spain Portugal from first century ad to 1109. It will be welcomed readers for its many detailed descriptions physical characteristics churches sarcophagi especially, but also mosques, mosaics, caskets, crosses altars, 150 original photographic illustrations John Batten, eight maps four sets plans. The organised in substantial chapters, chronological sequence, with a short introduction epilogue, extensive bibliography useful index. broad outline Walker’s argument that an infrastructure was created Roman period which influence following six hundred years, ‘shared visual language’ observable across Iberia other regions Empire. In fifth incoming Visigoths induced economic collapse political fragmentation, they re-used objects desire identify legacy. True renewal building began Muslim Córdoba second half eighth Christian North mid-ninth, as northern kings acquired wealth buy expertise South, developing ‘antique decorative vocabulary’ Byzantine, Carolingian Umayyad origin. Throughout tenth artistic invention flourished peninsula, courts caliphs ‘the main engine this process’ until dramatic Caliphate early eleventh transfer skills taifa kingdoms and, some extent, Catalonia Castile. New networks Pyrenees brought rulers churchmen into contact religious reformers put western European goldsmiths alongside Andalusi ivory workers (and masons sculptors), innovative results portable artworks. By 1109, long habit South–North interaction had ended, new obligations papacy were influencing relationships Almoravid South looked Africa rather than rest Iberian peninsula.
The English Historical Review