Suger

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Suger

(süzhĕr`), 1081–1151, French cleric and statesman, abbot of Saint-Denis from 1122, minister of kings Louis VI and Louis VII. Born into a peasant family and educated at the abbey of Saint-Denis, Suger was noted for his financial ability and his talent for conciliation. In 1147, Louis VII left on crusade and appointed a council of regency, of which Suger was the leading member. During his administration (1147–49) Suger succeeded in maintaining peace at home and in raising funds to meet the king's expenses. He liberated the abbey at Saint-Denis from the tribute formerly paid to exploiters, recovered alienated properties, built a new church, and enriched it with works of art; the church is sometimes considered the first great work of Gothic architectureGothic architecture and art,
structures (largely cathedrals and churches) and works of art first created in France in the 12th cent. that spread throughout Western Europe through the 15th cent., and in some locations into the 16th cent.
..... Click the link for more information. . At the same time he introduced a more severe discipline. His biography of Louis VI, whom he had known as a classmate, remains an important historical source; he also wrote fragments of a life of Louis VII, an account of his renovation of Saint-Denis (tr. 1946), and a work on his administration of the abbey.

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Suger

Born circa 1081, in Saint-Denis or Argenteuil; died Jan. 13,1151, in Saint-Denis.

Suger was abbot of the abbey of Saint-Denis, near Paris, from 1122 and was counselor to the French kings Louis VI and Louis VII. He was prominent in state administration and was regent of France in 1147–49, when Louis VII was on a crusade. His policy was aimed at placing the clerical and secular feudal lords completely under the power of the king. Suger is the author of a number of works that constitute a valuable source on the history of France.

WORKS

Oeuvres. Paris, 1867.
Vie de Louis VI le Gros. Paris, 1964.
In Russian translation:
“Kniga o delakh upravleniia. ...” Uch. zap. Leningradskogo pedagogicheskogo in-ta im. Gertsena, 1941, vol. 45, pp. 260–74.

Suger

1081--1151, French ecclesiastic and statesman, who acted as adviser to Louis VI and regent (1147--49) to Louis VII. As abbot of Saint-Denis (1122--51) he influenced the development of Gothic architecture

Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

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At the beginning, the Master Masons who built them remained largely anonymous (Abbot Suger, for instance, does not name the architect of St.

On gothic cathedrals and contemporary science

Longer term, the consequences of this week's Parisian championships are unlikely to have as much impact upon European cultural history as Abbot Suger's pointed arches, but the French have ensured they are designed to impress visitors they would not normally be allowed to invite while bidding to host an Olympic Games.

Athletics: BUSINESS OF SPORT - French success could spell end for London bid; The French have always had an eye to the future, writes Peter Sharkey

Seven centuries before the Impressionists, the Abbot Suger of the Royal Abbe of St.

Following Abbot Suger's advice, these churches were to be "pervaded by the wonderful and uninterrupted light of most radiant windows .

Abbot Suger noted that "pictures in the windows are there for the purpose of showing simple people who cannot read the Holy Scripture what they must believe," and a contemporary catechism urged that persons entering a church "walk around and contemplate its windows." With a complex visual vocabulary that would have identified various saints, virtues, and articles of faith, stained glass windows offered pilgrims and parishioners Old Testament prophets and figures, gospel parables and lessons, Christian martyrs and virgins, and images of creation, redemption, and the end of time.

Sometime you can see God through a window

For the shrine, I am thinking of an essay which does not explicitly take up the Utopian theme, but can, I believe, easily be seen in such terms: this is the fascinating commentary on the aesthetics of Abbot Suger of St.

There can be little doubt that, in Erasmus's description, we are receiving a faithful impression--albeit from a skeptical point of view--of a way of utilizing and understanding the medieval shrine which dates back at least to the codification of the Gothic aesthetic that can be found in the writings of Abbot Suger of St.

Shrines, gardens, utopias

Newth claims that they were probably composed under the influence of Abbot Suger and originally performed at the annual market of Lendit at the abbey of Saint Denis.

Newth, Michael A. H., ed. and trans., Fierabras and Floripas: A French Epic Allegory

Mounted hardstones crammed the treasuries of early collectors, such as Abbot Suger of St Denis in the 12th century, the Emperor Charles iv in the 14th and Jean, duc de Berry in the 15th.

No stone unturned: this sumptuous survey of pietre dure immediately establishes itself as a standard work

Abbot Suger (1081-1151), for example, cared intensely about the materials of works of art, arguing that "we must do homage [to God] also through the outward ornaments of sacred vessels" (quoted in Erwin Panofsky, "Abbot Suger of St.-Denis," in Meaning in the Visual Arts, New York [1955], 123).

Balancing acts: reading sources and weighing evidence in recent Italian renaissance art history

But if his work of 1924, Die deutsche Plastik des elften bis dreizehnten Jahrhunderts, reflected Goldschmidt's influence, Panofsky's writings of the 1940s and early 1950s on Gothic art show an entirely different spirit.(19) His introduction to Abbot Suger on the Abbey Church of St.-Denis and Its Art Treasures, for example, depicts a man with whom Panofsky evidently felt a great deal of sympathy.(20) Panofsky may have insisted that Suger, despite his strength as an individual, should not be interpreted as a proto-Renaissance figure.

But if Panofsky's Abbot Suger is arguably too close to Renaissance to be truly emblematic of the Gothic, Gothic Architecture and Scholasticism remains an unambiguous celebration of an era.(22) Indeed, Gothic Architecture and Scholasticism reads as if it were written by a convinced neo-Thomist, and some of Panofsky's assessments seem to have come directly from the Etienne Gilson's Reason and Revelation in the Middle Ages,(23) such as Panofsky's description of the century of Thomas as a cultural climax from which one could trace a decline into subjectivism.

Erwin Panofsky and the renascence of the Renaissance

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