page_title: Romanesque architecture in Spain
section_title: Churches
hierarchical_section_title: Romanesque architecture in Spain / Churches
caption_attribution_description: Planta de la Catedral de Santiago.
context_page_description: Romanesque architecture in Spain is the architectural style reflective of Romanesque architecture, with peculiar influences both from architectural styles outside the Iberian peninsula via Italy and France as well as traditional architectural patterns from within the peninsula. Romanesque architecture was developed in and propagated throughout Europe for more than two centuries, ranging approximately from the late tenth century until well into the thirteenth century.
  During the eighth century, though Carolingian Renaissance extended its influence to Christian Western Europe, Christian Spain remained attached to the traditional Hispano-Roman and Gothic culture, without being influenced by European cultural movements, until the arrival of the Romanesque.
  Romanesque architecture spread throughout the entire northern half of Spain, reaching as far as the Tagus river, at the height of the Reconquista and Repoblación, movements which greatly favoured the Romanesque development.
context_section_description: The temples of the First Romanesque are simple, with a single nave topped by a semicircular apse (without a transept). The prototype of the Romanesque church was non-rural, medium-sized and with the floor plan of a basilica with three naves containing three semicircular apses and a transept. Throughout the twelfth century the traditional Hispanic type temples with three straight and terraced apses were still being built in some areas (such as in the city of Zamora). Church plans were adapted to the liturgical needs, as the number of canons or friars who required more altars for their religious functions was increasing. Temples were built with Benedictine Cluny-style apses added. A long transept that could accommodate more apses was adopted in Cistercian architecture, and there are more examples of this type of construction. This feature was also adopted by the cathedrals (Tarragona, Lleida, Ourense and Sigüenza). There are also examples of cruciform structures that precisely depict a Latin cross, such as the eleventh-century Santa Marta de Tera church in Zamora, or the San Lorenzo de Zorita del Páramo church in Palencia, whose header is not square but semicircular. There are also circular plans, with a single nave such as the San Marcos church in Salamanca, or the Vera Cruz church in Segovia.
caption: Floor plan of the Santiago de Compostela Cathedral.
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