page_title: Aachen Cathedral
section_title: Carolingian Octagon (Palatine chapel)
hierarchical_section_title: Aachen Cathedral / Structure / Carolingian Octagon (Palatine chapel)
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Blick durch den Barbarossaleuchter in die Kuppel des Oktogons im Dom in de:Aachen, Denkmal
context_page_description: Aachen Cathedral is a Roman Catholic church in Aachen, Germany and the see of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Aachen.
  One of the oldest cathedrals in Europe, it was constructed by order of Emperor Charlemagne, who was buried there in 814. From 936 to 1531, the Palatine Chapel saw the coronation of thirty-one German kings and twelve queens. The church has been the mother church of the Diocese of Aachen since 1802.
context_section_description: The octagon in the centre of the cathedral was erected as the chapel of the Palace of Aachen between 796 and 805 on the model of other contemporary Byzantine buildings (e.g. the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna and the Little Hagia Sophia in Constantinople). The architect was Odo of Metz, and the original design was of a domed octagonal inner room enveloped by a 16 sided outer wall. The span and height of Charlemagne's Palatine chapel was unsurpassed north of the Alps for over two hundred years.
  The Palatine chapel consisted of a high octagonal room with a two-story circuit below. The inner octagon, with a diameter of 14.46 metres (47.4 ft), is made up of strong piers, on which an octagonal cloister vault lies, covering the central room. Around this inner octagon is a sixteen sided circuit of low groin vaults, supporting a high gallery above. This upper story was known as the Hochmünster (high church). The arched openings of the lower story are only about half as high as those of the Hochmünster, as a result of which the lower story looks stocky and bulky. The two floors are separated from each other by an expansive cornice. The high altar and Imperial throne are located on the upper circuit of the Palatine chapel in an octagonal side room, covered by a barrel vault lying on an angle. This area was connected with the palace by a passage. Above the arches of the gallery, an octagonal drum with window openings rises, on top of which is the cupola. On the east end was a small apse that protruded and was, in later years, replaced by the choir. Opposite of this, was the tiered entrance to the rest of the now defunct palace, Westwork. Light is brought in by a three tiered system of circular arched windows. The corners of the octagonal dome are joined with the walls with a system of paired pilasters with corinthian capitals.
  The upper gallery openings are divided by a grid of columns. These columns are ancient and come from St. Gereon in Cologne. Charlemagne allowed further spolia to be brought to Aachen from Rome and Ravenna at the end of the 8th century. In 1794, during the French occupation of the Rheinland, they were removed to Paris, but in 1815 up to half the pieces remaining in the Louvre were brought back to Aachen. In the 1840s they were restored to their original places once more and new columns of Odenberg granite were substituted for the missing columns. The interior walls were initially lined with a marble facade. The round arched openings in the upper floor in the side walls of the octagon, between the columns, in front of a mezzanine, are decorated with a metre-high railing of Carolingian bronze rails. These bronze rails were cast 1200 years ago in a single piece according to Roman models. The original cupola mosaic was probably executed around 800 and known from Medieval sources depicted Christ as the triumphant lord of the world, surrounded by the symbols of the Four Evangelists, with the twenty-four elders from the Apocalypse of John offering their crowns to him. In 1880/1 it was recreated by the Venetian workshop of Antonio Salviati, according to the plans of the Belgian architect Jean-Baptiste de Béthune. The dome was intricately decorated with a mosaic tile.
  The exterior walls of the Carolingian octagon, made of quarry stone, is largely unjointed and lacks further ornamentation. The only exception is that the projections of the pillars of the cupola are crowned by antique capitals. Above the Carolingian masonry, there is a Romanesque series of arches above a late Roman gable. The Octagon is crowned by unusual baroque vents.
  Aachen Cathedral was plastered red in the time of Charlemagne, according to the most recent findings of the Rheinish Office for Monuments. This plaster was made longer-lasting through the addition of crushed red brick. The colour was probably also a reference to the imperial associations of the work.
caption: The Barbarossa chandelier under the dome of the Octagon
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA", "Image Make": "OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP.", "Image Model": "E-5", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "OLYMPUS Viewer 3 1.21W", "Image DateTime": "2014:04:24 01:08:03", "Image Artist": "", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image Copyright": "Arnoldius", "Image ExifOffset": "432", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "9150", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "9442", "EXIF ExposureTime": "2/5", "EXIF FNumber": "71/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Aperture Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "250", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2014:04:16 14:12:39", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2014:04:16 14:12:39", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "-3/10", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "4", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "9", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4032", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3024", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "9010", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[2, 0, 2, 0, 2, 1, 1, 0]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "High gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal"}