# Historically Based Room Acoustic Analysis and Auralization of a Church in the 1470s
## 5 Discussion  
The room acoustic analysis of the reconstructed abbey reveals the presence of two distinct acoustical subspaces, which coincides with locations of significant liturgical importance. The nuns' gallery and the monks' choir are characterized by shorter EDT, greater G, and improved \(C_{80}\) compared to the rest of the church. These better acoustic conditions facilitate the auditory elements of liturgical practices, which are a fundamental part of the monastical congregations' daily tasks. Examples of such subspaces have been found in many other worship spaces [31; 32; 33] and are sometimes referred to as a \"church within a church\", indicating their role as an exclusive environment for the initiated. The presence of two such locations, rather than one, is an expected consequence of the presence of two separate monastic enclosures within the same church. Despite their similarity as acoustic subspaces with improved conditions for liturgical activities, there are distinct differences between the gallery and the choir. The proximity of the gallery to the vaulted ceiling both improves the clarity within it and results in a rather homogenous sound field in the naive when a sound source is located in the gallery. Withinthe choir, as compared to within the gallery, the reverberation time is more significantly different to that in the naive. This could imply a weaker coupling between the acoustic subspace in the choir and the naive, than between the gallery and the naive. This could be a reason for the poor acoustic transmission from the choir to the naive. Such differences may reflect a religious intent, irrespective of whether there was an acoustical intent in the design. The position of the gallery reflects a religious intent to premier the nuns within this abbey, and the improved acoustic transmission from this location supports this intent. Its location makes the gallery both acoustically and visually characteristic for the whole church, and establishes the nuns' position as central within the monastic order. The reflections from the ceiling vaults cause the nuns' chants to be perceived as coming \"from above\". This could reflect an acoustic intent of making the nuns sound more heavenly. The spatial variations in the church can be heard in the auralizations (as presented in the supplementary material) of elements from a Friday sext. When both source and listener is in the gallery, or both in the choir, intelligibility is acceptable and the acoustics support chants, prayers, and responsories sufficiently to seem plausible. Reverberation from the nave can be heard, but is not strong enough to dominate the sound field. The services as perceived outside the respective monassical subspace give a very different impression. Individual syllables can not be distinguished, the locations of the sound sources are difficult to determine and the reverberance dominates perceived sound. This is the case for the perception of monks from within the gallery, nuns from within the choir and both from within the naive. Monks and nuns sound distant, yet omnipresent. Liturgical interactions between monks, nuns or people in the naive were thus likely not possible during daily services. Further analysis of the auralizations themselves, with listening tests, could lead to additional insights regarding the experiences of historical visitors to this place. For example, the introduction of HRTFs is needed in order to evaluate the perceptual impact of the nuns' elevated position, to further evaluate the theory of their voices sounding more heavenly. Such research could show more clearly the perceptual differences between the experiences of the monassical congregations and the pilgrims. Furthermore, it may be possible to use the results of the simulation as a tool for VR performances, where singers experience the \"live\" simulated acoustics of the historical space as they sing. Such setups may minimize the effects of recording in an anechoic chamber.