| This dissertation, which explores the connection between the sculpture of Modena Cathedral and the historical conditions of its conception and creation, begins by focusing on the nature of documentary evidence in the Prologue's discussion of the limits of historical understanding. Chapter One examines notions of history, both medieval and modern, as they are related to the historiography of the cathedral. Chapter Two analyzes the relationship of the Arthurian archivolt on the Porta della Pescheria to the Porta dei Principi, located on the southern flank of the cathedral, a connection heretofore ignored. In earlier investigations, the Arthurian archivolt on the Porta della Pescheria had been understood as a purely secular image, while the Porta dei Principi, with its lintel scenes of the life of San Geminiano, has been treated as a simple hagiographic narrative of Modena's patron saint.;The structural and visual affinities between the two doorways can be correlated to the connection between their stories and the significant increase in historical writing in the twelfth century, specifically contemporary chronicles of the First Crusade. The persuasive narratives of the Crusade chronicles explained human history as an ever-expanding sacred reality in which past and present were seen as coexistent. Within this construct of Cosmic History, the visual narratives of Arthur and San Geminiano were interpreted as heroic tales associated with the contemporary reality of the Crusades. Such tales, when interpreted within the Church's teleological history, presaged a messianic vision of the Apocalypse. The stories of Arthur and San Geminiano were thus understood to conform to a cosmic history in which the central figures possessed both sacred and heroic meaning.;Chapter Three considers the sculpture of the two side doors in relation to the sculpture of the west facade, where four large, separate panels depict scenes from Genesis. The particular choice of Old Testament imagery can be related to the twelfth-century's emphasis on a universal world history. The meaning of Modena's exterior sculpture is seen to be multivalent in its structural and narrative connections with twelfth-century mappaemundi. Similar to medieval world maps, the vernacular present seen in the story of Arthur becomes the critical support of a great historia which unites the two poles of the distant biblical past and the ultimate end of days of the Second Coming. |
